


Broken Time: Whatever Happened to Torchwood 4?

by certifiedgeek



Series: Doctor Who: Canonical Tales by CertifiedGeek [2]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Gender Neutral Character, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-06
Updated: 2017-12-24
Packaged: 2019-02-11 12:07:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 50,054
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12934947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/certifiedgeek/pseuds/certifiedgeek
Summary: When Torchwood 4 steal an unfinished version of Toshiko Sato's Time Lock program they unleash a chain of events which threaten swallow Chiswick, England and the world in a defective time tunnel merging past, present and future and fracturing time itself. Can the Doctor and Donna save them? Story completed, posting as edited.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This story has been completed and is being posted as I edit each chapter. Constructive crit is welcomed but I would ask that you take a leaf from the Doctor's book and try to be kind. Obviously I own nothing so usual disclaimers apply.

"I still don't think this is a good idea."

Max Bryant scowled across the office with dark brown eyes, recessed in the shadows of high cheekbones, smoldering with anger.

"Then it's a good job no-one asked for your opinion or cooperation." The rebuke came with a cynical smile and a wink from principal scientist Eleanor Parks. Her attention focused on four oversized computer monitors, all of which held different information and images.

The door to the large office opened and a broad-shouldered man with a well-kept beard strode in, carrying three mugs of coffee and a newspaper tucked under his right armpit.

"Max's right, Ellie," he said placing the mugs on a central table and pushing one towards each of his companions. "We shouldn't be stealing from our own people. It's unethical."

Ellie rolled her eyes but did not lose focus, "How long have you worked for Torchwood, Darijus?"

Darijus smoothed his beard and twisted a little wax into his mustache, "14 years. Long enough to know ethics have surprisingly little to do with business."

Still scowling, Max turned to Darijus. "I didn't know they were recruiting in Eastern Europe that long ago."

A rough bark of laughter growled from Darijus's throat, "Recruited is a euphemism. Let us just say I could not refuse the offer given to me. The Lithuanian government did not sanction my creative use of DNA and my removal from society had been organised. Torchwood rescued me, in exchange for my services."

"Torchwood got a lot of staff that way," said Ellie, with no indication of her personal feelings on the matter. "Some good, some with moral codes about as antiquated and abhorrent as Jack the Ripper's. But they've found talent, and the Cardiff hub is awash with it. Frankly I'd rather work with Ms Sato than steal from her, but those are our orders, and I'm not going to piss off Colonel Garde by ignoring them. Now shut up both of you. I'm trying to concentrate."

Max and Darijus feigned insult and Darijus turned his attention to the newspaper, the black and white print broken by pictures of Euro 2008. Max picked up a coffee mug and sauntered over to Ellie's computer, standing behind her and watching the screen which displayed the Cardiff hub's security monitor.

Torchwood Three was half lit, only a few computer screens flickered and strip lights partially illuminated an industrial style building. Max's eager eyes searched up and down the screen.

"I heard they have a pterodactyl. I would give anything to see that."

"Jesus, grow up, Max." Ellie snapped, "Do you believe every bloody myth they spread about that place?"

Max grinned and extended a long, slender finger over Ellie's shoulder deliberately close to her ear, brushing her dark hair with the top corner of the second monitor darkened as a shadow of a something huge flapped across the screen.

"Go on, pan up for a second. Let me see it, please?"

Max felt an elbow thrust back and stepped aside just before it made contact with flesh and bone. "Okay, okay!"

Ellie's attention was on another screen, one that mirrored Toshiko Sato's main computer. Streams of code poured across the monitor, green text on black, and Ellie bit her lip and leant closer to the screen as she fought to keep up.

The computer speakers clicked with the sound of a door opening and Max jumped back to the monitor scanning for the source of the noise. Max grabbed a secondary control and shifted the view to the main doors as they closed behind a trail of four people, all covered in what looked like biological matter.

"I am never going to be clean again!" Gwen Cooper's Welsh tones rang through the room.

"Throw the entrails into Myfanwy's feeding trough and get a full decontamination," ordered Jack Harkness, the tail of his coat just visible as Max panned sideways."And then get yourselves a stiff drink. My office, 30 minutes."

Darijus appeared at Ellie's other shoulder, "Abort. Tell Margaret you couldn't do it tonight. We'll try again next time they get a call out."

"I can't abort." Ellie snarled at him, "If I stop now the intrusion will show on their system. We're at ninety two percent."

"Sato is guaranteed to check her computer before she hits the shower," Max warned and pulled the camera in a slow rotation to Sato's desk, wary of drawing attention to the camera with a sudden movement.

"If you can't say something helpful, shut up." Ellie snapped, sweat breaking across her forehead.

"Are you sure Myfanwy can eat this stuff, Jack?" Ianto Jones stepped into view, his face a grimace as he scooped flesh and other body components from his pockets. "It is alien protein after all."

The pterodactyl swooped down through the centre of the building and shrieked in disapproval.

"She'll enjoy the change from sheep." Jack responded from a distance, his voice quiet but his cheerfulness still evident.

Darijus jabbed the left side of the CCTV screen. "They have a drone. Max, can you get control of it and make it move just enough to draw their attention, if we need a diversion?"

Max nodded, "Yes, but I can better that, and be less conspicuous. I can trigger the fire alarm. There's a sensor over the computer in the far corner of their office. All I have to do is make the sensor think the temperature has gone up and…"

"Not yet," Ellie barked. "Ninety six percent. Don't do anything unless absolutely necessary."

"Owen?" Tosh entered the room from the door below the security camera. "Did you turn my computer on? How many times do I have to tell you to leave my workstation alone?"

"Shit!" Max and Ellie cursed in unison.

Max battered the keyboard with swift, nimble fingers and a small temperature gauge at the side of the screen rose like a thermometer in a mug of hot tea.

"I didn't touch anything." Owen's voice was faint over the speakers,"Am I your favourite whipping boy at the moment? For God's sake go out and get yourself a boyfriend, or a girlfriend. I really don't care."

The progression marker on Ellie's screen flipped over to green as the download reached one hundred percent. With a flourish she snapped closed the programme and sent a stream of code to cover her tracks. Torchwood Three's fire alarm blared making the speakers crackle with the sudden increase in volume.

"Jack! I think our firewall's been hack…"

There was a soft click as the audio cut out and one brief glimpse of Toshiko Sato's face as she looked up at the security camera, eyes narrowed with suspicion.

Darijus slapped Ellie on the back and laughed with relief and pleasure, "That was close! I do not like to think what Margaret would have done to us if you'd been caught."

"If I'd been caught?" she shoved him away from her console with mock anger, "That was a team effort."

Darijus sidled away, scooping up his paper and making for the door. "I am just glad I will not have to conduct your autopsy today."

At a computer station on the other side of the room Max was flipping through the Torchwood personnel files. Gwen's profile filled the screen and Max regarded her with interest. Darijus glimpsed the screen before he crossed the threshold and hesitated in the doorway.

"Do you have a new crush, Max?"

Max shrugged, "There's something about her…"

Darijus wolf whistled and Ellie skated her chair across the floor to join Max at the computer.

"Mind you," Max's voice was wistful, "There's something about Owen too. Maybe I like the accent."

"You'd have more luck with Harkness," Ellie sniffed, turning back to her work, "I hear he'll screw anything, whatever gender it is - or isn't."

There was a sharp crack as Max's chair launched across the room and collided with Ellie's work station sending coffee across her keyboard. Darijus swung back into the room in one smooth motion dropping his paper onto the central table and placing himself between Ellie and Max. Darijus's huge hand landed on Max's slight shoulder and Ellie smirked as her colleague simmered with anger.

"What the hell is going on in here?"

In the doorway stood the diminutive figure of retired Colonel Margaret Garde, dressed in her habitual olive green. Though she carried no firearms, at least in the hub, she ran Torchwood 4 like a military operation. Every member of the team feared and respected her in equal measure. Colonel Garde appraised the situation, observed the discarded chair, the dripping coffee and drew her conclusions. These scenes were not uncommon and the culprits always incriminated themselves.

"Parks, this is the last time I warn you about baiting Bryant. This isn't a military posting so we abide by the regulations of Human Resources. You will accept Bryant's differences and learn to live with them. I know exactly where Torchwood found you, and we could put you back in a deeper, darker hole if you don't start showing your colleagues some respect."

Ellie found it within her to look chagrin and nodded a curt, unfriendly, acknowledgement of Garde's order.

"And for pity's sake Bryant stop giving her ammunition. You work with five people in this bunker, learn to deal with them. God knows if you get thrown into Civi Street you'd be eaten alive."

Max shrugged off Darijus's hand and snapped, "Yes, ma'am."

Garde looked at her team with a mix of disdain and disbelief. Five years ago she had been in charge of soldiers, there were no niceties then, less Human Resources rules to follow and it wasn't unknown to solve issues by physically banging two heads together. Torchwood, as cloak and dagger as it was, still kept up the pretence of being a government agency, along with most of the regulations.

"Were you at least successful, Parks?" Garde cut through Ellie's look of superiority which she was firing at Max, her head cocked and eyebrows raised challenging her subordinate to cross her again.

Ellie gestured to the computer which was dripping with cold coffee. "We obtained the programme..."

"...but we were noticed." Max jumped in.

"Bryant, when I want your report I will ask for it." Garde snapped. She turned back to Ellie who was inching away from her colleagues, disassociating herself from their existence. "Were we compromised?"

"Perhaps. I have erased everything that would lead them back to us and left a fake trail which would lead them to North Korea if they suspected anything. Max set off their fire alarm as a distraction but Sato looked directly as the security camera. They knew they had been hacked and were being watched."

"We can always claim we were conducting a penetration test, and they failed." Max offered in a terse but polite tone.

With the immediate risk of violence abated Darijus released the tension in his neck with a roll of the head. Pulling out the sports section of his paper he dropped the rest of the paper into the puddle of coffee pooling under Ellie's desk and crushed black-and-white photo of the Prime Minister into the floor with his shoe.

"If you do not require my presence, I have analysis of my own to attend to." Darijus excused himself, "I will ask Arjun to bring you the mop and bucket."

Garde inclined her head with a silent acknowledgement of Darijus's departure. Of all the team Darijus's was the easiest to manage, he knew he was better off in Britain than Lithuania, and he would not jeopardise his position for any minor issue.

"What can you tell me about the programme?" Garde asked, forcing Parks and Bryant to flank her, left and right, at Park's computer.

Ellie opened the download folder and dragged the application across the sandbox window and into the live environment. The screen turned dark for a moment and the lights in the hub dimmed, flickered and a bulb across the room exploded.

"Power drain," Max's face darkened with a deep frown. Taking a seat at another station Max pulled up the system monitors. "Whatever that programme does it's causing a massive power surge in Ellie's computer, all the juice is being sucked into that one machine."

"Shut it down," Garde barked, "We will black out half of London at this rate."

A humourless laugh escaped Max's lips, "Too late for that. Power is fluctuating between Southampton and Norfolk."

"Bryant, get me a line to the Prime Minister."

"I can't," Max replied, "Something has fried our exchange box."

Colonel Garde bit back a series of profanities. "Fix this, both of you, I'm going up top to get a mobile signal."

As the door closed behind the colonel Ellie and Max exchanged bitter looks and refused to move from their respective seats. The lights dimmed and crackled again, another bulb burst nearer to the desks, showering them with glass.

"Oh for God's sake," Max exclaimed in frustration and held out a hand as a peace offering, "I'll be the bigger man."

Ellie snarled, "So you're a man now are you? Come on, we've all seen your birth certificate."

Two more bulbs blew leaving a single strip light to illuminate the room with the help of the computer monitors. Electricity arched across blown bulb sockets.

Max's hand didn't waver, "You want my help to fix this, take my hand and promise you won't use my identity against me ever again."

Poker faced, Ellie ignored the proffered hand and turned to her console. Her eyes scanned the scrolling green text and her a sudden sweat broke across her forehead.

"Stop it, Max. Get up here and help. This is some kind of time manipulation software and it's overloading every system we've got."

Ellie glanced back at Max who was remained still, hand outstretched.

"Now, Max! I'm not making this up!"

Max held position, a small, slight smile visible in the low light.

"Fine!" Ellie yelled, grabbing the extended hand and pulling upwards, "I swear I won't take the piss of your he/she identity any more. Just cut the damn power before this blows up on us."

"I'm not a he/she," Max countered, taking a seat and starting the shutdown processes. "I'm androgynous. Not male or female. I'm neutral - like Switzerland in World War Two."

"Whatever," Ellie snapped back, "You're still a fricking pain in my backside and I still don't like you."

Max cut the power to the air processing unit. "Feeling's mutual."

There was a low moaning sound that seemed to creep up from the earth. It rattled the walls sending cracks streaking up through the white painted plaster, and shook the ceiling until the tiles gave way, wire began to fall, and dust filled the air.

"The surge is just getting bigger," Max yelled above the din. "It doesn't make sense. It's like its drawing power from somewhere else."

Darijus barrelled through the door which rattled on its hinges before collapsing under pressure from above as the ceiling stay fractured.

"Get in the emergency room!" Darijus shouted, grabbing both Ellie and Max by the arm.

Max shook Darijus off and dove back to the computer, "There's something wrong with the shut off switches, they are locked open."

Another ceiling panel fell, this time landing on the computer just as Darijus dragged Max away for a second time. The whole room shook with the force of an earthquake. The remaining lights flickered and went out, a tiny emergency green light dangled precariously over the emergency room door.

With another shove Darijus hurled Max into the small, steel lined room. Behind them half the ceiling collapsed and dirt from the ground above covered the floor.

There was a violent crack as the electricity arced around the ceiling. The ground rocked. Dirt fell, and the world turned black.


	2. Chapter 2

"Now THAT was a party!"

The Doctor stumbled over the threshold of the TARDIS still holding a very tall glass half full of purple liquid in one hand. His other hand hung on to the door frame and guided his unsteady movements across the room until he collapsed on the jump seat behind the control console. He beamed a crooked smile at Donna Noble as she appeared in the doorway, long blue gown hooked away from her feet and balled up in her clenched fingers. A long shawl hung over her shoulders and her red hair curled in loose ringlets around her face.

"Oh that, that was amazing!" she agreed, leaning against the door which had closed behind her without a sound. "I have never been to a party like that in my life… and right now I don't think I could ever do it again. That was exhausting!"

"Thirty two hours of dancing, drinking and feasting, all because ten thousand years ago two people fell in love and united a divided solar system," his eyes took on the faraway look of a man reminiscing. "Oh, and they were a lovely couple. I remember them well."

Still leaning against the door frame Donna stared at him with wide, disbelieving eyes. "You were there? Ten thousand years ago?"

He grinned and winked, "You didn't think the blue theme and the fireworks were a coincidence did you?"

"Fireworks?" She frowned and peeled herself off the door frame in search of another support.

A long finger pointed to the console where a dozen sticky notes in Gallifreyan script stuck to any available smooth surface. Donna stepped closer and blinked twice before realisation set in.

"That was Gallifreyan writing, in the fireworks?"

"Yup," he agreed, a self satisfied smirk sitting on his face.

"It was beautiful. It was like a work of art," she pealed one a note from its sticking place and took a seat next to him, leaning shoulder to shoulder, turning the writing in every direction trying to work out if there was a pattern to the ornate script.

He took her hand and twisted it into the correct orientation, which made no difference to Donna at all.

"What did it say?" she asked, interrupting him as he pulled the note closer to his face, "Not your note, dumbo, the fireworks?"

"It's a blessing which is, for the most part, saved for commitment ceremonies - like weddings. It's a complex way of wishing the participants a lifetime of love, joy and peace."

"I'd hate to take a spelling test on Gallifrey," Donna observed, "I can't make head nor tail of this. How come the TARDIS doesn't translate that? It translates everything else."

"Almost everything," the Doctor mumbled and took the note from her fingers with a reverence reserved for ancient texts and holy books. "She doesn't translate Gallifreyan because I don't want her to."

Donna noted the darkening of the Doctor's smile and tried to lift the mood again. "Well I'm glad I can't read it in English, because if I could I wouldn't see the beautiful writing."

"I tell you what though," a brighter tone settled into the Doctor's voice as he reached across and stuck the note back where it had been, "I haven't partied so hard since… well since I was at the court of King Louis 15thof France."

"Name dropping again," she gave him a playful shove, "When are you going to take me to meet someone famous?"

"Oh I don't plan any of this... well, not often." He trailed off realising that he was giving Donna far too much room to tease him the next time they needed a plan, and he didn't have one.

A mauve light flashed on the console and the Doctor's sudden move upwards left Donna tottering to one side while she tried to regain her balance. With a flick of a switch a small hole opened in the floor and the Doctor tipped the purple drink into a recycling shoot without looking, his attention directed to the controls in front of him.

His companion read the look on his face in an instant and hurried to her feet, casting away the shawl and her own drink.

"What is it?"

"Something bad," he replied, running to the other side of the console to spin a dial. "Something, mauve and bad."

The TARDIS groaned and fought to pull away from the ceased handbrake and with a lurch ripped itself from the soil on which it stood. All the Doctor's strength and weight and will could not hold the TARDIS and Donna could tell my the Doctor's pained expression that the wrenching noises were not only terrible news but that every agonised cry of his ship cut into his soul. The handbrake leapt away from him and the Doctor turned his attention the whirling dials and the klaxon that was growing louder by the second.

"It's all right, old girl," he cooed, caressing the console with his left hand whilst the right flipped a dozen switches, shutting off the alarms.

"Can I help?" Donna appeared at his side but he shoved her backwards as he scrambled to another part of the controls. She threw up her hands in surrender and stepped aside, watching as his frenzied movements slowed and a sense of relative calm descended.

The monitor screen fizzed until it displayed a stream of Gallifreyan and the Doctor's eyes widened as he read.

"Oh this is beyond bad," his voice was soft. "Something is wrong with time, with the universe. It's like time and matter are bleeding out from this universe and into something else…."

"How can time bleed out of this universe?" Donna asked, "I mean, where can it go?"

A still, serious expression fell over the Doctor's features. "Two years ago I wouldn't have thought it possible, but now, now I've travelled to a parallel universe… I think anything is possible."

"Parallel universe?" she repeated, a frown in her voice, "Like where you left Rose?"

He nodded, "But a hole between two universe is extremely unlikely to happen as a natural occurrence. I mean nature doesn't allow for it… and even when there was a hole between the two there was no real cross contamination... What happened at Canary Wharf required two universe to be working in collaboration even if they didn't know they were, and it didn't make my ship quake in her boots and try to run for the other side of the universe."

"Canary Wharf?"

The Doctor looked at her, his exasperation evident. "Cybermen taking over the world…"

"Oh, yeah, I remember. I was scuba diving. You told me about it before."

His face contorted in an expression of serious consideration, "Well, given the situation, underwater was probably one of the safest places to be. Still, that's not answering the question."

Donna frowned, "What was the question? You, you're always going off tangent. It's hard to keep up!"

"It was your question! How can a universe bleed? Ookay so assuming you have two universe running in parallel, and someone punches a hole from one to another. It's very dangerous and unpredictable. You could end up anywhere in space, and if you're a real novice at it, you could be anywhere in time too. Dimension jumping is outlawed by almost all species clever enough to develop it."

He was pacing now. Up and down on a straight line behind the console, spinning on the heel of his Converse trainer at the end of every length. He glanced at Donna to check she was keeping up and received a nod of affirmation.

"So someone punches a hole between universe but there's no bleeding?"

"There are several ways of doing it, but though in theory it ispossible they are highly unlikely. In every conceivable deliberate attempt to link two universe the tunnel would be two way - you or want to get back after all. But every universe has its own energy, a force…"

"What are you? Yoda?"

"...a force which although it has its own signature is essentially the same, assuming all parallel universe comprise the same matter, of course. But, that energy doesn't want to be linked. Parallel universe aren't supposed to be connected, so they repel each other, keeping what belongs in each universe where it should be. Bar the occasional traveller."

The mauve lights on the console were constant now, the flashing so fast that they appeared steady, and a warning message was flashing up on the monitor in Gallifreyan and English. Donna peered at it and grabbed the Doctor's arm as he was passing, forcing him to stop and read.

"Earth," he groaned, "Why is it always Earth? Can't you lot keep out of trouble for five minutes?"

"Oh my God," Donna exclaimed, her face draining of colour, "Has Earth gone into another universe?"

"Of course not," he answered, "Not possible. Well, when I say not possible I mean it is technically possible but not likely. Certainly not in the 21stcentury. You lot are barely in the stars even by the end of it. You aren't seriously looking at new world colonisation for another millennia."

"When in the 21stcentury?" Donna asked, the Doctor's response making her feel no better.

Moving her aside he adjusted the monitor and scanned the information, "2008. Someone's got their hands on alien tech then, or it's technically advanced aliens using Earth as a base. It's probably America, or maybe Japan. That would be nice, I can't remember the last time I was in Japan. Lovely people the Japanese."

The TARDIS lurched again and a hollow, echoing wail rose up through the coral.

"She's scared," Donna spoke in hushed tones, "I've never known the TARDIS be scared before."

"It's not a very big hole," the Doctor reassured her, "Only about two-and-a-half square miles, that's tiny in terms of the universe. You could walk across it in half an hour. We'll to be precise it's two point two square miles. Somewhere in England, who says the English are dull? It's… it's..."

Donna stared at him, her mouth dry, "I worked for the planning department for about a month. Two point two square miles is exactly the size of…"

"Chiswick."

They spoke the word together, both pairs of eyes widening and the remaining blood draining from Donna's face. With lightning moves the Doctor cut off the safety protocols, and with alternate coaxing and pleading, convinced the TARDIS not to run away from, but run into danger.

"It's going to be a rough landing," the Doctor warned her. "Chiswick hasn't fallen through the bleed yet but the whole area is unstable. I don't understand what's happened.I'm getting readings that don't make sense. It's like Chiswick, well England, the Earth, the Universe, is being pulled out of existence."

"To a parallel universe?" Donna leant over his shoulder in a vain attempt to make sense of the small display screen.

He shook his head, "That's impossible. You can't sustain two universe in one."

"Is Chiswick safe? Gramps and Mum…"

The Doctor looked at her with the dark, serious expression Donna had learnt to dread. He stepped back from the controls to take her forearms in his hands and meet her gaze with a look of determination and sincerity, "Chiswick isn't safe, Donna. I'm not sure what is. But I promise you; we will fix this."

"We?" a nervous laugh echoed around the room, "What am I going to do? I'm just a temp? A temp from a place that isn't going to exist any more in… in how long? How long will it take for Chiswick to bleed out of this universe?"

"No idea, could be five minutes, could be five hours, could be five weeks," he gave himself a mental kick, "But that will not happen."

The floor beneath their feet vibrated, and the Doctor spun back to the controls. Around them the whirring and wheezing of materialisation drowned out any other words they may have spoken. The TARDIS bucked and reared like an unbroken horse tossing the occupants of the console room into the air. The lights turned red, the TARDIS careered sideways and the last thing Donna saw was the Doctor clinging to the rails as she flew backwards, her head cracking on a coral upright sending her into darkness.

"Donna?" the Doctor's voice was urgent and pleading, "Donna, can you hear me?"

She screwed shut her eyes as consciousness rose, accompanied by an exquisite pain that pummelled the back of her head. Other sensations returned in small steps. The first was the damp feeling on her back, the second was the cold, the third was liquid dripping on her skin. Donna opened one eye and then the other she saw the Doctor looking down at her and realised he had cocooned her head in his hands. They were almost nose to nose, a realisation that made Donna pull back with a snap.

"It's okay," he sat back a little himself and as Donna's eyes focused she saw worried lines on his face ease away. "You banged your head, you've been unconscious for about 5 minutes that's all. Missed the worst of the landing. I had to drag you outside, the TARDIS is full of smoke."

"It's raining," she muttered, shivering in the cold and trying to sit up. "My dress is ruined!"

"I don't think the TARDIS is fairing much better," the Doctor replied, casting an eye behind him to his beloved ship which lay at an angle pressed into a bank of soil, smoke seeping through the hinges of the closed door. "She may never forgive me for this."

With the Doctor's help Donna stood up, wincing at the sharp pain in her head and some unexplained throbbing in her side.

"Where are we?" she asked as she tried to get her bearings.

"In the nearest piece of clear ground to the epicentre of the problem. The strange thing is I can't see anything in any direction. Which is lucky considering the landing."

Donna looked behind them at the gouge dug into the dirt that stretched back beyond view. Grass and mud coated the side of the TARDIS and debris splattered the Doctor's immaculate suit making him look like a teenager had been bored at a wedding and skipped out to play football.

"Is this Chiswick?" Donna used the Doctor's arm to get to her feet. "It looks a bit... rural"

"It is Chiswick, at least according to the TARDIS. I think the better question is when is this." He stuck out his tongue and took a deep inhale. "Salt, factory smoke, fires, smog... 19th century, 1834 I think. Doesn't feel right though, something in the air is giving me goosebumps."

"But we were aiming for 2008." Donna brushed the wet dirt from her blue dress succeeding only in smearing mud everywhere.

"Yes," his response was slow, "Better early than late I suppose. Without the TARDIS we'll have to do this the hard way. "

Donna rolled her eyes, "When do we ever do anything the easy way?"

"Come on. We are going exploring."

The sun, though shinning, was dulled by a thick grey smog that hung low on the air. Through the gloom Donna could make out the shapes of well established trees, great bows linked in a canopy that seemed to loom over the travellers in every direction. The ground was wet from a heavy downfall of rain which had left puddles in the long grass that looped over their shoes, making walking an effort. The Doctor linked his arm with his companion in a gesture of chivalry and in a bid not to lose her. Still wearing the party shoes her stiletto heels dug aggressively into the soft soil, making their progress slow. The silence was unnerving and Donna found herself shivering, not just from the cool air but from an inexplicable sense of unease that filled her stomach with snakes.

"I don't know anywhere in Chiswick like this. Not in 2008. The only open space we have are public parks."

"Times change," he replied as he fished the sonic screwdriver from his pocket. "The industrial revolution started the real growth in the cities. In just over a hundred years rural Chiswick will be urbanised. In another hundred years they will run out of space and will start building tower blocks. Five hundred years from now they'll be building in the middle of the Thames. The price of progress I suppose."

A snot shot through Donna's nostrils, "Progress, is that what's destroying the world in my time?"

"Yeah, all that pollution. You lot should really learn to recycle and walk more," the Doctor agreed, distracted and listening to the unhappy whirring of the screwdriver. "I'm getting very strange readings. Distortions, ripples of a major energy expenditure, near this spot."

He stopped dead and dropped Donna's arm making a small crop circle in the grass as he spun round and round, first in one direction then the other, tripping over his feet as he went. Held in the Doctor's tight grip the screwdriver flashed and whirred more rapidly until it found the right direction.

"There," the Doctor pointed, "Just beyond those trees."

Mud splashed in his wake as the Doctor took off at a run, arm outstretched as he followed the guidance of his trusted screwdriver. Donna tottered behind him for a few steps before swearing in frustration and ripping off the shoes that were proving to be such a hindrance. Looping them around her fingers she grimaced as her bar toes squelched into the soft muddy ground, cold wet earth squelching between her toes. Reluctant and unhappy Donna forced herself into a trot, following the Doctor into the tree line.

On the other side of the trees the grass was trimmed to perfection and a gradual slope lead down to a circular pond which had at its centre a tall white obelisk with a cherub at two sides. To her right was a building that Donna felt she should recognise. It was small, only the size of a tiny country church and white painted with Roman columns leading to a closed, circular room with a high domed roof. The Doctor was standing by the first of the steps that led up to the colonnade, sniffing the air, his face wrinkled with puzzlement and distaste.

"There was a massive power surge close to this point," he brushed his tongue against his teeth, trying to rub the atmospheric flavours from his palate. "Can you taste it?"

Disgust registered on Donna's face but she found herself sticking her tongue out and tasting the air.

"Oh my God," she says, "It tastes like… well like the Marsh Estate smells on Saturday nights. Burning tyres and aerosol cans."

He nodded in agreement, nostrils flared, sniffing the air with a dubious caution. "Oh this wasn't just a power surge, this must have used enough power to turn off the lights across half of Europe!"

"But there's nothing here, nothing that uses power anyway."

"Maybe there is… inside..."

"Oh!" Donna exclaimed with excitement, "Hang on a minute. I know where we are. I've been here, loads of times, with Mum and Dad. Over there, that's Alfcombe Manor, and this is the funny temple thing. We used to sit over there in the amphitheatre and have a picnic."

"Amphitheatre?" The Doctor spun round and stared out into the smog.

She nodded and pointed to the other side of the pond which was only just visible. The Doctor followed the direction of her finger and could just make out the slope of the land.

"That's why the signal is so strong here, the acoustics of the place have captured the remnants of the energy and the smog has helped stop it escaping into the atmosphere. Donna, you're brilliant!"

Donna pretended not to hear the compliment. "So are we standing about here or going in? I'm freezing."

"Well, if you will insist on wearing inappropriate footwear and clothing…" he glanced down and realised she was now barefooted, the heeled shoes poised to smack him in the arm at any second.

"Oi!" Donna raised her voice in frustration, "If you hadn't crashed the TARDIS I would have had time to change."

The Doctor's trainers squeaked a little on the stone steps muttering half under his breath, "Well if you humans would stop breaking the universe I wouldn't have had to come in the first place."

Stepping over the threshold and into the relative dark of the temple they ceased their bickering and the Doctor reached behind him to take Donna's hand. In other circumstances his companion would have complained, said she wasn't one of the school kids he was used to travelling with and she didn't need a hand to hold. But there was something immeasurably reassuring about his fingers wrapped tight around hers as her bare feet touched the cold stone floor. She slid for the first few steps, mud oozing out from her stockings and he helped her balance without a single mocking remark though Donna was sure the comments were on the tip of his tongue.

"How far back does it go?" Donna asked, trying not to make much sound. Every movement echoed around the walls and it felt as though their presence would be discovered at any second. There was something about the place that gave Donna the creeps. She was beginning to feel as though she was walking through a graveyard and did not want to wake the sleepers in the earth below.

"There's a door at the back I think. I can make out some kind of opening. Just a few more steps."

His foot slipped on something slick on the floor and, as he regained his stance, he heard a sharp intake of breath beside him as Donna's bare skin made contact with the same substance. He felt her grip on his hand lock in a silent terror.

"Oh god," she whispered, panic seeping into her voice, "That's warm. What is it? What am I walking in?"

The Doctor bent his knees, bringing his face closer to the ground and using the sonic screwdriver's blue light to illuminate the puddle. With sudden comprehension of his find the Doctor jumped up and guided Donna sideways and backwards until they were standing against the far wall in the darkest part of the room. From a pocket he pulled a large handkerchief and then said in a gentle voice.

"I'm sorry Donna, it's… it's biological matter…"

His companion froze, her fingers digging into the skin on his hand as her brain translated his words into simple terms.

"Biological matter..." she swallowed hard enough for the Doctor to hear, "You mean blood?"

"I've got a handkerchief in my hand to clean it up. I'll do it if you want."

There was a long silence. In the meagre light the Doctor could see the outline of Donna's chest, rising and falling in rapid succession. When her other hand reached for his, he pressed the handkerchief into her palm and helped her to balance as she scrubbed her foot.

"Thanks," she managed with a tight voice, "I don't suppose you want this back."

The Doctor squeezed her hand, and the bloodied cloth was dropped onto the floor.

"Stay here," the instruction was firm, "I'm going to investigate."

Donna had no intention of moving anywhere and her back hugged the wall as she watched the Doctor, sonic screwdriver in hand step away, retracing their steps until he came to the pool of warm, congealing blood.

Turning up the brightness of the sonic to maximum he scoured the floor for the source. It didn't take long to find. The remains of a body laid prone on the floor, dark clothing saturated with blood. Possessing a strong stomach was a necessity for a Time Traveller, but as the sonic passed down the corpse the Doctor felt bile rising in his throat and an uncomfortable needling sensation pricked his skin.

At his feet lay a woman, mobile phone in an outstretched right hand, the left side of her body severed and missing.


	3. Chapter 3

Intermittent emergency lighting flickered in the confines of the panic room. Buried by fallen rations packs, blankets and sundry supplies, the Torchwood staff clung to each other, heads tucked against their tightly curled knees, fingers pressed into the skin of their compatriots. The world had stopped shaking, and the alarms were silent. The only sounds any of them could hear was the pounding of their hearts and the occasional item falling to the ground in the lab outside.

"I think it's over," Max coughed and dared to look out from under the blanket that formed a loose shield over all their heads.

"Is everyone all right?" Darijus threw the temporary shelter to the floor, and when both companions who nodded their confirmations he added. "There are miracles."

A scrabbling sound, the shifting of small items, was followed by a bright beam of light as Ellie found a torch amongst the survival gear. Flipping it into lantern mode she stood on trembling legs and held the lamp at arms length allowing them all a fair view of their immediate situation. The ceiling bowed to the pressure from above but the door frame had remained intact. The door itself was crooked in its hinges, but held tight by the crushed surround. Darijus and Max took to their feet with equal unsteadiness, pushing sundry items clear until there was place to stand on the floor itself. From the pile of fallen items Darijus produced an additional torch and added its brilliance the room. Using the increased brightness to locate first aid kits he clipped one to his belt and thrust another into Ellie's empty hand.

By the door their emergency "go bags" still hung in their cabinets. Carabener clips attached the backpacks to metal railings, and the reflective strips on each bag shimmered in the torch light. With both hands free Max sifted through the fallen provisions. A knife, more torches and a flare gun were stowed in the already well-stocked bags, the contents crushed in without care.

"Are you ready?" Max asked the others, gesturing towards the door.

Darijus grasped the door handle and pulled. The weight of the collapsing ceiling bore down on the frame holding the exit closed. Max picked up a coil of rope from the floorand looped it through the handle, throwing the other end to Ellie who wrapped it around her fist.

"On three," Darijus instructed, lowering the lever again and grasping the handle with both hands. "One, two, three!"

Ellie's sandals slipped on the floorand she put all her weight into the movement and she fell into the arms of Max whose boots provided a better grip. Max's arm wrapped around Ellie's waist, hauling her upright pulling them nose to nose. They stood still for a moment, eyes locked, before Ellie inclined her head a fraction in a nod of appreciation and Max released her.

"If you two love birds are finished..." Darijus gestured to the door..."We have made progress. Max, you are the slightest person here. Slip through and give this door a push."

Max nodded and tossed the rope to Darijus approaching the door with caution as pieces of ceiling showered over them. The gap between door and frame was just wide enough to Max to slid through and Ellie handed a light through the gap.

"Okay," Max said, clearing a foot space to work in, "I'm ready. On your mark, Darijus."

With two shoves the door opened enough for Darijus and Ellie to escape. With the final push the ceiling rattled, a portion of it giving way showering them with brick dust, metal and soil. The metal of the safe room bowed further and the three hurried to salvage as many supplies as possible in case the roof collapsed. Grab bags, blankets, torches and food were dragged over the threshold, piled up by Max's feet before another loud cracking sound forced them to retreat.

"I thought that was supposed to be a saferoom," Ellie complained. "Safe from what exactly?"

Darijus shrugged, "It's old, a hundred years or thereabouts. The cast iron has corroded. I suppose it was on the list of repairs Torchwood intended to make before they moved us in here."

"Well, we're alive," Max said dryly, "So it worked. I don't suppose anyone expected anything on the scale of an earthquake."

"That was no earthquake," Darijus's remark was casual. "I have been in one or two. That is not how they feel."

Ellie reached into her grab bag and pulled out a pair of trainers, swapping her sandals for sensible shoes. From a side pocket she picked out a small handheld device with no screen or wires, just a single button which, when pressed, made a small light flash amber on the top.

"That's not good." Ellie muttered, holding the device up for the others to see. "The emergency transponder isn't connecting to the Torchwood network."

"Maybe we are too far underground," Darijus suggested.

"Look at this place," Max breathed.

Three torches rose to head height and more of the room became visible. Brick walls bowed, the once neat line of bricks twisted with the occasional one missing as though someone had been playing Jenga with the structure. Most of the tables had toppled over and the computers lay on the floor their guts exposed in wires and hard drives. Light fittings dangled from the ceiling, the bulbs shattered and the glass spread around the floor. Sticky remains of their morning coffee formed a black, stain on the ground. The door to the hallway had become wedged in the frame, the angle of its rest supporting the remains of electrical trunking that had been screwed to the wall above it.

"Are the two way radios working?" Max asked, taking a mobile phone from a pocketand changing the mode from cellular to radio.

There was a fizz and static. Darijus produced a similar device from his pocketand activated it. The crackle of Darijus' radio burst through Max's handset.

"That's a good sign," Ellie let a relieved sigh slip through her lips.

Darijus clicked the call switch, "Margaret , this is Darijus. Come in, please. Over."

Darijus' voice crackled over Max's phone, but there was no response from their team leader.

"Arjun?" Max made the call this time. "Arjun, report in please."

"Maybe they are out of range."

Max and Darijus shook their heads in unison, both pocketing their phones and looking grim.

"These phones are enhanced with alien tech," Max told her, "You could be 50 miles away and they would still work."

"Underground?" Ellie asked.

Max shrugged, "You would think they'd be tested for that."

Darijus checked the exit to the corridor, peering under the door at the hall beyond it. His torch beam searched up the corridor walls in a careful grid until he had seen everything visible from his vantage point.

"Corridor is clear," he told them as he dropped his pack from his shoulders. "It will be a bit of a squeeze getting through here, but after the door we should be fine."

Max and Ellie nodded, deferring to Darijus seniority in pay grade and experience. Darijus had worked for Torchwood the longest, but he had a darker past in Lithuania. One night, after some vodka, he had told them of his time in the Lithuanian Army. Even Margaret had developed a new level of respect for him that night. Neither Max nor Ellie had signed up to Torchwood to be field agents. Though from time to time they left the facility to undertake alien capture exercises, they spent most their time glued to their desks trying to decipher alien software.

"We should be armed," Darijus spoke to neither of them in particular. "I said not carrying a sidearm in the hub was a mistake."

"It was a brownout," Ellie countered. "Nothing to worry about."

"You are only fooling yourself if you believe that," Darijus replied as shoved his backpack under the door and crawled through after it, small pocket torch held tight in his teeth.

Ellie followed, leaving the bag on her back and becoming wedged for a moment before Max freed her with a satisfying shove. There was a muffled curse as Ellie fell forward onto the floor.

"Thanks," she muttered, turning her head to see Max grin and slide through the gap without any effort at all.

Darijus lead the way along the corridor shining his torch up and down with tactical precision, observing everything. The walls were old and brick, the mortar loosened by recent events but still secure and solid. Wide enough only to walk in single file the tunnel was cylindrical, giving the impression that it was a drain or some other service duct from the Victorian era. Set on a steep incline the passageway was buried under many metres of earth. It felt perpetually cold and smelt of damp, both sensations made more imposing by the dim, mobile light of the torches.

Three hundred metres up the tunnel opened into a high domed circular chamber upon which five additional channels converged. Two appeared sealed, huge clods of concrete barring entry. Two other's led off into a maze of tunnels and chambers which made up the medical labs, holding chambers, interrogation cells, sleeping compartments, storage, catering facilities and a range of other necessities found on all Torchwood bases. The final tunnel led to the surface with no deviations or side shoots. One thousand metres of steep incline and cold, dripping water.

The chamber in which all the tunnels met had earned the nickname of Grand Central. No-one in the team knew the reason for the construction of the tunnels but they, and the small chambers that they linked, had provided sanctuary from German bombs in the last war. One of the closed tunnels, according the schematics, led down to the Thames, the other had been sealed off by a ceiling collapse before Torchwood had taken over ownership of the premises.

"We should check on Arjun," Max said, starting to walk towards the administrative and domestic area of the base.

Darijus caste an eye to the exit tunnel, "And we must assess the extent of the damage. Arjun will have gone to the surface if he was able."

Max hesitated and shone a torch down the passageway hoping to pick up a sign of movement. Ellie and Darijus followed suite with the other routes, peering into the darkness but finding nothing. Each passageway was as dark and silent as the next. Darijus clicked his radio again and called Margaret and Arjun twice over without response and an uneasy silence fell over the party.

Scuffing the dirt with her shoe Ellie broke the quiet. "I don't think we should split up."

"Don't be such a…." Max didn't finish the sentence under Darijus' withering stare.

"Academics!" he complained coarsely, "In my country you would never have been allowed in the field."

Ellie's chin jutted out in offence, "We are not, and have never been, fieldagents. We are the tech crew, three others were scheduled to join as fieldagents before the incident at Canary Wharf."

Max sniffed and checked the passage one more time. "Well, we're fieldagents now."

Darijus shook his head and ignored them both as he considered the options available. Max and Ellie did not work well together, even in imminent danger. Max was volatile and unpredictable but had basic field medic training and was practical, fit and strong. Ellie was less practical and had no first aid experience but had a more critical, calculating mind, making her the better problem solver. Sending one to look for Arjun would be a mistake, leaving them together could prove disastrous.

"We go to Arjun's office, but no further." Darijus made the decision and gestured to Max to walk on, his tone giving neither of them room for argument. "If he is not there we assume he has made it to the surface. Or, that he was not on the base at all."

"Arjun is always here," Ellie's tone was matter of fact. "He split up with his girlfriend last month, he's been sleeping in the bunks since."

"I hadn't noticed," Darijus fell into step behind Max who was walking at a slower pace than he liked. "I thought only that he was coming in early to manage the filing and prepare team breakfast."

Max turned slightly, calling back over a shoulder, "He was cooking breakfast after he did his studies. He's on the Fast Track programme. In September he starts operative training."

Darijus nodded in approval, "Good. Arjun will make a good operative. He pays attention, and can walk and talk much faster than you. Hurry up, Max. You should not be afraid of spiders in the dark down here. There are worse things in the cells."

"I hadn't thought of the cells," Max admitted, "They have deadlocks though, physical locks, not electrical. And padlocks. So unless the doors gave way…"

"Cast iron isn't going to move that easily," Darijus reassured them. "And if the locks were broken Protocol One would have been implemented. So either way, there is nothing to worry about."

Behind the other's, in the dark, Ellie scowled. Protocol One was the extermination of prisoners in the event of cell failure. It was not an operating procedure with which she agreed.

Max's faster pace ended with a jolt making Ellie walk into Darijus' backpack. Darijus peered over Max's shoulder and shone a second torch towards the source of Max's concern. The door to the clerical area was blown from its hinges and lay obstructing the path. A clump of short black hair stuck out from beneath it.

"Arjun?" Darijus pushed Max flat against the tunnel side and barrelled passed, dropping to one knee and shining the torch into the cavity created by the door. Max and Ellie stood on either side of the passageway and bathed the area in light, giving Darijus both hands to check for life signs. With a small shake of the head Darijus delivered the bad news without needing to speak.

"He was only 21," Max whispered, "Would have been twenty two next week."

"Instantaneous, I would think," Darijus said as if offering some small compensation. "Broken neck, the door probably collapsed as he was trying to escape."

With a gentle wave of his hand Darijus closed the boy's eyes and made the sign of the cross with bowed head. Max muttered something that the others could not hear and Ellie wiped a damp spot from her cheek. Ceremony complete Darijus jerked his head in the direction they had come and Ellie took the lead in a slow, silent walk towards the surface.

The smell of fresh air seeped into the tunnel mouth providing a resurgence of enthusiasm. When the power was on air conditioning circulated recycled but breathable oxygen through the complex, without the power the air in the tunnels quickly took on the odours of the ancient bricks and the dirt above making it feel harder to breathe. Beyond the security door the security lights were out, but something bright was shining far away from them, a brilliant spot pointing down the tunnel.

"Margaret?" Ellie called, her voice full of nerves carried hardly any distance at all.

Darijus cupped his hands over his mouth and called up, "Colonel Garde?"

Ellie broke into a jog, much to Darijus' relief, and the light in front of them grew brighter as they approached. They were ten metres from the tunnel exit when it became clear the light was a lost torch, abandoned and unaccompanied.

"Will the security grid let us out?" Max queried as Darijus scooped up the hand held torch and turned it off, slipping it into the pocketof his combat trousers.

"It will be offline in a brown out," Ellie said, "But we all have a mechanical key for emergencies. Mine's in the pocket…" she hesitated, "… damn, it's in the pocketof my jacket back in the office."

"We'll use mine," Darijus cut in, adding for Ellie's benefit, "Colonel Garde will not be pleased with your security arrangements."

Ellie shrugged, "I'm not worried. The front door is wide open. Margaret can reprimand herself!"

Darijus leant over Max and grabbed Ellie's shoulder forcing them all into a tight and uncomfortable proximity to one another. Ellie's trainers kicked up dust as she stopped and she felt Max squirm sideways to allow Darijus clear passage.

"Something is not right," Darijus flashed his torch up and down the open door.

Max leant forward. "Can you smell that?"

Ellie sniffed, "There's something… like burning. Like battery acid."

Darijus took a deep breath and noted the smell as well. "It is electrical, and rubber maybe. But there is something else something I am familiar with."

"It's like a memory," Max decided, inhaling again, "One you can't quite grasp."

"It's not important," Darijus started moving forward again. "Stay by the door while I check the exit chamber."

Ellie and Max hung back as Darijus walked on, watching him scan the area until his torch stopped and hovered in one area. Something curt and rough rolled off his tongue in Lithuanian as he disappeared beyond their view. Left behind, curiosity drove the two onwards, round the edge of the door and into the larger chamber beyond. Unwilling to disobey Darijus' instruction they lingered here, pointing their torches at Darijus' back.

Ahead of them Darijus was on his knees, torch on the floor, hands outstretched. He turned and moved something, and the torch rolled backwards, down the slight slope towards them. Max trained a light to Darijus' right, Ellie to his left, blanketing him in as much light as they could manage.

"Darijus?" Max called, seeing the man frozen in position. Taking two steps forward the torch beam wobbled and Darijus swung round, eyes wide with shock.

"No!" he shouted with urgency in his voice, "Stay back!"

"What is it?" Ellie asked, coming to stand beside Max. "What they hell is that on the floor?"

Max followed Ellie's gaze and swallowed hard, "Oh god, I think that might be blood."

"Colonel Garde?"

Darijus stood up and marched backto them, picking up his torch on the way and shining the light directly in their faces to blind them.

"What the hell…?" Max complained raising an arm as a shield.

When he was close enough Darijus pushed both Ellie and Max backwards against the wall, drawing their attention from his find and backto him.

"I believe Colonel Garde is dead," he said shortly.

Ellie frowned, "You believe? You're a doctor can't you tell?"

"There is significant blood on the floor," Darijus gestured behind him with his head, "But the remains are incomplete."

Watching the question form on both sets of lips Darijus continued, "Colonel Garde's left arm and leg are on the floor. The rest of her body is not."

Max felt the blood drain to the pit of the stomach and swallowed nausea, "Severed? By what?"

"I don't know. I do not think it possible to survive the trauma. As precise as it was immediate medical attention would have been required."

"I think I'm going to be sick," Ellie's voice was faint and Max reached across to take her elbow.

Despite his years of experience Darijus looked pale under the torch light. "I do not know what could have caused this, but I believe our best course of action is to evacuate, seal the area and report to our superiors for assistance."

"You'll get no arguments here," Max agreed. "Let's get the hell out of Dodge."

Ellie shook off Max's supportive hand and gestured to the far side of the room which was in complete darkness. "We should be able to see outside from here," she said. "It was just after eleven in the morning when I started the download. It should be daylight."

Darijus checked his watch, "Thirteen oh seven. It should be daylight."

They moved with caution, three abreast, torches pointing to the far wall where the entrance opened onto the colonnade and pond beyond. Max's torch caught something white and the other two focused their beams on the target.

"It's the obelisk," Ellie confirmed with relief. "At least that's still standing. It would be hard to explain…"

In unison they found their path blocked by an invisible wall that knocked their torches from their hands.

"What the hell is that?" As the first to regain a torch Max pointed it at the wall and braved reaching another hand towards the invisible barrier. The wall vibrated and rippled but could not be passed.

"Spread out," Darijus instructed, "It does not hurt to touch so follow the edges, see if there's a gap. Do not lose sight of each other."

"We can hardly lose each other," Ellie muttered in Max's ear. "This chamber is only a few metres across."

Darijus went left, leaving Ellie and Max to conduct a slower assessment of the situation and preventing them from seeing what was left of their commander. The invisible wall stretched above his ability to reach and down to the floor and right up to the wall at his side of the room. The pebble he threw at it did not bounce off but instead became lodged mid air, hanging in a structure that looked like gel, and rippled when touched. Exit through the normal channels was not going to be possible.

Max and Ellie returned to the doorway their faces and their tongues subdued. Ellie dropped her pack to the floor and used it as a seat while Max pulled a packet of cigarettes from a jacket pocket and lit two, handing the first to Ellie without a word.

"Let's try the backdoor," Max suggested, looking back down the passageway.

Ellie tooka long drag on her cigarette and blew a plume of smoke into the air, watching it hang for a moment before rising upwards.

"No-one's used the back door in months," she countered.

"We check it," Darijus said, putting a stop to an argument before it started. "And put those cigarettes out."

Max tooka deliberately long, slow drag before stubbing out the cigarette on the wall. Darijus hesitated and looked back at the remains of their commander. It was undignified to leave her as she was and Arjun would need to be moved to cold storage as well.

"Max," Darijus called, breaking the reverie, "You know the base schematics better than anyone. Are there any other exits after the back door?"

There was a pause before Max spoke and in the absence of conversation all three could hear a distant clanking and rumbling. "One of the sealed tunnels used to lead down to the Thames. They probably concreted it up but I'm sure there is some ordnance in the store that would help with that."

"We could try to blast through the wall," Ellie waved the half smoked cigarette in the direction of the barrier having ignored Darijus' instruction to extinguish it.

"We could, but I do not think it will work." Darijus replied. He surveyed the room again. "We need to know what we are dealing with before we start blowing things up. The emergency generator runs on oil, yes?"

Ellie nodded, "Yes, and the tank was filled recently. Colonel Garde moaned about the cost."

"Then we go back inside. Start the generator and find some computers that work."

"What about Arjun and… well what's left of Margaret?" the question that no-one wanted to ask came from Max's lips.

"I will put them in the morgue," Darijus was sombre. "Max, check the back door. Ellie make the computer lab functional."

"Do you think it's something to do with the programme we stole from Cardiff?" Max asked Ellie with genuine curiosity.

"Possibly," Ellie admitted, "But the power went out before it finished opening."

"What was this software?" Darijus lead the way back into the tunnel.

"It was supposed to be a security programme, but it was still in development."

"Well," said Darijus with a bark of laughter, "We are secure now."

The passageway felt colder now as they trekked back down into the ruins of their base. For the first time that Max could remember the walls were running with water, clear liquid seeping through the mortar, dripping icy drops onto their heads and down their necks making them shiver. They walked without speaking, listening to the thudding of their footfall as it echoed along the long corridors. When they came to the junction of tunnels Ellie returned to the lab, Max walked on to check the other exit leaving Darijus the tasks of moving Arjun's body and starting the generator.

In the lab Ellie surveyed the damage with more care under the glare of her torch. Max's computers had been decimated and lay in pieces across the floor but the monitors, which were fixed to the wall, had survived intact. Ellie's computer tower had fared better but her laptop was nowhere in immediate view. Systematically Ellie began the clear up, making space around the computer desk and salvaging any still useable items and gathering them in a bent metal waste paper bin.

Max returned with a grim expression and with a combined effort and the assistance of a chair leg as a lever, they removed the broken door from its frame before making a swift pile of damaged kit in one corner of the room. Lifting Ellie's desk between them Ellie set about rebuilding the best of the computers while Max located the power sockets which did not look to have burnt out.

"There's an invisible wall around the other exit," Max confirmed, "Judging by the position we are stuck in the middle of a bubble. I should think even if we blasted out the concrete caps over the old tunnels we still wouldn't be able to get through."

"What do you think happened to Margaret?" Ellie asked, dropping an extension lead on the desk and trailing the other end back to the socket on the opposite side of the room.

Max shrugged, "I don't know. Did you see… did you see the limbs?"

"I couldn't help but look," Ellie admitted, "They were severed cleanly but not cauterised."

"I could see a guillotine doing that much damage, even factory machinery. But there's nothing out in the entrance hall. Nothing at all. Just stone and marble."

Ellie nodded agreement, "It doesn't make sense."

They looked at each other, acknowledging the horror and offering a strange sort of comfort through the silence.

"I don't really hate you," Ellie blurted out, her face flushing.

A half smile crossed Max's face, "We aren't dying. Don't say stuff you don't mean."

Ellie tugged her shirt away from her throat, "Don't be a dick. I'm apologising."

"Accepted," Max stepped forward and offered a handin peace, "And I don't set out to annoy you. It comes naturally."

Ellie took Max's handin a firm grip, "At last, something we agree on."

There was a low buzz and two light fittings fizzed. There were two more mechanical crunches and then the low drone of the air conditioning turning on. In the corridor a light flickered into existence and although the room stayed dark a row of indicator lights began to flash red on the server boards.

"I'm going to rig up some lighting," Maxsaid, dropping Ellie's hand and heading into the safe room where fluorescent tubes and upright stands were stored.

In a few moments two strip lights illuminated the area. They turned off their torches and looked over the room once more.

"I don't think an earthquake could have done more damage," Maxsaid looking at the cracks in the walls. "If they refit this place, it's going to cost a fortune."

"Not really my main concern," Ellie said, her voice tight. "Look at this…"

Ellie had managed to recover her computer but as it restarted, it had opened up the programme it had been running when the power had gone out. On a cracked monitor complex code scrolled vertically, running faster than it was possible to read. There was a low rumble in the earth and the room shook again.

"Turn it off!" Max reached for the power button but Ellie swiped away the extended hand.

"It's something to do with this programme," she said as she tried to make sense of what she was reading. "I think we need to know what it's doing in order to deactivate that wall."

"It's also draining the power," Max noted, gesturing to the fluorescent lamps that had begun to flicker and dim. "Just turn it off."

Ellie tried to end the programme, but it rejected her input. She tried again and there was a loud pop of electricity which made her recoil and suck at electrocuted fingers.

"What the hell?" Max leant over and reached for the power button.

The world began to shake again, and the lights flickered hard. With an explosion loud enough to wake half of London the computer burst into life, spinning more and more code across the screen until there was another rush of electricity. Ellie stood frozen at the computer screen, hand poised over the keyboard completely motionless.

"Turn the damn thing off!" Max shouted. When Ellie did not move Max reached a hand back to the power switch but an invisible wall blocked the move.

Lead landed heavily in Max's stomach and the outstretched hand closed into a fist before dropping to Max's thigh. There was another invisible wall, and this time Ellie, and the computer, were sealed inside.


	4. Chapter 4

The trip back to the TARDIS had been as unexpected as it had been welcome. Operating on a form of autopilot she did not know existed Donna had stowed her disgust and horror in a box deep inside, holding it in silence as they trudged back. Cold, wet, mud oozed between her toes swamping any remaining biological matter and cleansing it from her skin. That was, at least, what Donna told herself. Her stoicism made the Doctor uneasy, and he sought her hand, which she gripped with uncommon ferocity. In the dark he could not see the stream of soundless tears that trickled over her moon bleached skin.

When the TARDIS door had opened the decontamination programme ran without warning coating Donna in an icy mist. Blue light swept from the tips of her hair to edge of her toes and back up again. She accepted the procedure with little protest, mollified by the Doctor's apologetic expression as she opened her mouth to complain. After a lengthy shower and a change of clothes Donna reappeared in the console room, knee high boots encasing her feet in armour, jeans, purple t-shirt and a long grey sweater. Though she did her best to appear unphased both she and the Doctor knew it was a show for both their benefits.

"Are you okay?" the Doctor met her by the jump seat, looking her up and down with a critical eye but resisting the desire to scan her again, just to be sure. He had an almost overwhelming urge to hug her, but the pain in her eyes dissuaded him.

Donna raised a fake smile, "Yeah… bit weird. Very disgusting. But that poor woman… " she swallowed hard and put her focus into the tasks ahead. "Do you know who she was?"

The Doctor reached into his pocket and produced a silver dog tag, dangling it from the end of his finger before dropping it into Donna's palm.

"Colonel Margaret Garde," he said and crossed back to the control console, drawing up something on the monitor. "I've run the serial number but it comes up blank."

Donna turned the tag over in her fingers, she'd dated a soldier once, well if she was honest it was a two night stand. He had had little conversation and didn't have a lot good to say about his female CO. "Colonel? In the 1800s? Even I know that's not right."

"No," the Doctor agreed, "It's not. Metal dogs tags weren't issued until the 1960's, but these are from your time."

"But you said this was 1830 something…"

"It is!"

Donna handed the tag back to him. Holding it in her hand brought a sickness to her stomach and a lump to her throat. "But how can that be?"

"I said there was a hole in the universe," he took her elbow and guided her towards the display screen upon which a green whirlwind spun, equations running at either side. "I thought it was a parallel universe, I couldn't image what else could cause to much damage so quickly. But I was wrong…"

He saw a grin of amusement light up Donna's face and he pouted, "Yes, yes, you can make fun out of that later. But it's so much worse than a parallel universe. It's like someone punched a hole in the fabric of time and space creating wormhole."

"Like a time tunnel?" Donna smirked as he pulled a face at her description, "Where you can travel to any time in the past? Wait, I saw that when I was a kid."

"Science fiction," The Doctor's faced wrinkled in a wince of frustration, "It has a lot to answer for. This 'time tunnel' is past, present, future rolled into one, and for the moment frozen. Stuck at the start of its rotation, which should be impossible. It's not neat. You have no control over it. This is a swirling mass of time, starting small, but spreading. Step into that and you could end up anywhere. Last Friday night down the pub, sixty years from now, at the dawn of the universe or at the end of it. It's not like travelling with a vortex manipulator where you have base codes to help you set location, or travelling in the TARDIS. There's not much you can do to control it, unless you're very, very clever, and even then it's a gamble I wouldn't want to make."

"It's not like you actually control the TARDIS," she nudged him in the ribs and a spark of light flickered in his eyes.

"I thought I did very well chasing that taxi," he said, fake indignation written across his features.

Donna tapped the screen with her forefinger, "But humans in 1834 can't travel in time."

"Humans don't create their own time travel, ever," he mused, scratching his head half way through running his fingers through his hair, "Beg, borrow, steal, adapt - yes - but devise something like this... no."

"So it's alien?" Donna asked, a look of total surprise covering her face. "There are aliens in Chiswick? There are aliens in Chiswick in 1834? No!"

He rolled his eyes, "There are aliens everywhere, Donna, they are just good at blending in. You had one as Prime Minister…"

"Who?" Donna asked, "Harriet Jones? I knew it, she was a weird one…"

"Harold Saxon!" his expression was incredulous. "And what about the spaceship that crashed into Big Ben? Or.. or the Autons… the shop dummies that came to life?"

"I wasn't very observant before I met you... but I'm better now." Donna pointed her index finger towards the silent alarm panel on the console which flashed mauve once more.

The Doctor followed her finger and stared, his brain taking a fraction of a second to realise what she was pointing at.

"Oh, no, no, no!" the Doctor's eyes widened as his ship rattled and the time tunnel on the screen pulsed more rapidly, spinning and rippling as it moved. "The time tunnel is unstable, and it is drawing more power from somewhere, reinforcing its mass."

Donna's blank face and open hand gesture spurred him on.

"It's like we're sitting on the edge of Niagara Falls and the strength of gravity is pulling us over," he explained with so much speed that the words fell over one another and Donna tried her best to keep up. "The width of the wormhole is widening. Like a great big, hungry, mouth it is trying to swallow up more energy. Before it had a tentative connection, just holding open the wormhole, dangerous enough but contained. Somehow it has harnessed more energy, and it's growing. Every time it stores enough power it moves, twisting, bringing all the periods of time closer together, like… like a skein of wool being twisted until all the strands knot together. As it twists a bit more of the surrounding land gets sucked in, making it bigger. And it won't stop, it will just keep consuming more time and more of the world until the world has gone."

Fear began to creep into Donna's brain. "How much has it grown?"

"A few hundred metres for now, it's right outside the front door, give or take a few steps," a look of dread crossed his face and he spun into action. "I have to move the TARDIS to a safe distance before we are caught in the wormhole."

There was a terrible sound of wrenching and the TARDIS wailed like a great sea creature bellowing from the depths. It was a sound Donna had never heard before and, looking at the Doctor's face, she realised the Doctor had never experienced it either. He circled the console at speed, looping backwards and forwards, turning dials that ratcheted as they moved, pumping levers and prodding switches whilst his machine wailed. The blue glow of the central column dimmed and around them the lights faded until the only real brightness came from the monitor screen which continued to display the spinning wormhole.

"She's shutting down," the Doctor cried, "Trying to stop her energy being used to perpetuate the cycle. But if she does that…"

There was a shift in the earth on which the TARDIS stood and with a jolt the Doctor and Donna pitched away from the console. Donna landed against the jump seat and grabbed it with one hand, remaining upright. The Doctor stumbled to her right, missed the seat and tripped over his own feet, falling to the floor with his eyes screwed shut, his body crashing onto the metal grid floor. As the TARDIS stabilised a low light crept up from the grating at their feet and the central column dimmed into complete darkness.

"Doctor?" Donna looked down at his dark, curled, silhouette on his side in a foetal position on the floor.

A low groan murmured through his lips and he moved only to curl into a tighter ball. His arms wrapped around his skinny torso, fists bunched and hanging on to his jacket, knees up to his chest.

Donna dropped to the ground and gripped his shoulder with her hand. "Come on spaceman, we've had worse rides than that one."

He sucked air in through gritted teeth and forced himself to straighten. In the dim blue light his face was cast in shadow but his eyes were wide with determination. With a spring of movement he launched himself upright, staggered and perched on the jump seat, inhaling a long deep breath which he held for a moment as he blinked away dizziness.

"We moved," he said, his voice a little above a whisper.

Donna stared at him, "Well, yes. That's why you fell on the floor."

He cleared his throat and shook his head, "No, I mean we moved in time."

She frowned and placed the back of her hand on his forehead in a vain attempt to check his temperature. He felt cold to her touch, but that was normal as far as Donna could tell. He brushed her hand away, cupping her fingers in his for a moment in a show of appreciation.

"But the time rotor thingy turned off. We can't have moved anywhere."

"I felt it," he explained. "I'm a Time Lord, Donna. That means I'm linked to time. Every moment, every movement of time and space, it's connected to me. And just now we were ripped through time. We must have fallen into the wormhole and we've been bumped in one direction or the other."

"Oh my God," her eyes grew wide and her jaw dropped open a fraction, "That's what…"

He nodded, looking down as Donna's hand grip his forearm in empathy. "Yeah, sorry. It hurts, having your connection to the universe dragged away from your soul."

"Have we stopped?" she looked back at the monitor which had turned an unhelpful shade of black.

"Yes," the Doctor rolled his shoulders and cracked his neck, "For now."

"Where do you think we are?"

"Same place we were," he said, heading towards the TARDIS doors while pulling on his long coat and stuffing the sonic screwdriver into a pocket, "It's when that will be the interesting part."

"We're going out there," Donna looked uncomfortable.

A reassuring smile crossed his lips, "Well it's no safer in here, and we can't solve the problem locked inside a sleeping TARDIS."

The Doctor extended his hand to Donna, and she rolled her eyes at him as she walked towards the door, grabbing her jacket as she went.

Outside the wind was biting, and the ground was white with a hard frost. Donna's boots crunched on the short cropped grass of what was clearly now a maintained park and she drew her coat around her more closely. To the east the sun was rising over a thick clump of trees behind which factory chimneys belched columns of smoke. To the west another line of trees was broken by red brick houses with chimneys pumping coal smoke into the thin line of cloud that glowed red with the dawn.

The Doctor breathed in the cold air and closed his eyes, reconnecting with Time and gathering his bearings. In the light of the morning sun he looked pale and a thin line of strain pulled his skin taught at the side of his jaw. He exhaled in a controlled, slow, breath, watching the gases from his lungs condense in the freezing air.

"1901," he announced. "We didn't travel far."

"I still don't believe you can tell the time like that," Donna said making him smile. "Where are we heading?"

The Doctor gestured to the trees, "Back into the temple. It's the source of the problem, or something inside it is."

"How do you know that?" she asked as they strode across the field.

"The TARDIS," he replied with heaviness in his tone, "Despite the wormhole disrupting her sensors she navigated to the place closest to the source of the anomaly. She didn't want to go right into it, and quite right too. Being inside the time fluctuations will destroy her."

"Does that mean we are stranded?"

The Doctor nodded, "Stuck in a time tunnel that will keep spinning and growing. And we'll be tugged along for the ride."

"And everyone else? All the people who live here, the past, the present… the future… what happens to them?"

"I don't know," he admitted.

Donna laughed at the irony, "Finally, something you don't know!"

"It's good not to know everything. It leaves room for surprises." The Doctor flashed a smile at her as he ducked under a low tree branch taking them into the strip of woodland that surrounded the temple.

"How long have we got before the TARDIS is lost?"

"Oh… ages," he tried to sound positive but was grounded by Donna's stare of scrutiny, "Every time the time tunnel shifts it takes breaks a little of the TARDIS' protective shields. Once they deplete the energy inside the TARDIS will be exposed. The interaction of the two time elements will do one of three things; repel each other - like putting two positive magnets together, the TARDIS may contain the wormhole, but that would burn out her core eventually…"

"And the third option?" Donna's mouth tasted of dust.

The Doctor stopped walking and turned back to face his companion, his expression grave.

"The wormhole would absorb the energy of the TARDIS and grow exponentially swallowing Chiswick, England, the Earth, the solar system… not stopping, growing bigger with every energy source it encountered."

"A bit more at stake than normal then," she said with a forced cheerful smile, "Well, come on then. Why are we standing about talking when there's a planet to save?"

The pond around the obelisk had turned to ice, Donna noted, as they walked down the bank of the amphitheatre, following the contours of the land as they approached the Ionic temple from a slightly different angle than before. The heavy frost made it look as though the ground was covered in a light snow and through the gaps in the leafless trees Donna could make out an artificial light shining at the big house. Across the water the innocuous looking temple was unchanged, save for a small wreath which had been laid on the steps.

"Is it Christmas?" Donna asked as she stepped around the offering.

"No," the Doctor said, bending to examine the circle of dark leaves, "It's a mourning wreath. 1901, Queen Victoria has just died."

He brushed the leaves with his fingers and his lips curled a little at the edges.

"I met her once," he continued, still on one knee on the steps, "In Scotland. We were knighted, Rose and I. Just before we were banished."

"You met Queen Victoria?" Donna was querulous.

The Doctor stood up and brushed the frost from his trousers, "Saved her from a werewolf. It was a lot of fun… which in retrospect is probably why we were exiled. I should be a little less… enthusiastic… when saving royalty from certain death in the future."

"If you think I'm calling you sir you can forget it," Donna quipped.

"She'd have liked you," he said as they crossed the threshold, "You're generally less naked than Rose was."

Donna raised her hands in disgust, "I really don't want to know."

In the dawn's light the interior of the temple felt smaller that before, a circular main room with a door at the back. The room was empty with no indication that anything at all was out of the ordinary. The Doctor approached the far door with no apparent caution. Half way across the room his step faltered, and he shivered, looking back for a second before continuing to the door. With a long, slow, creak the heavy oak door swung back on its hinges opening not to a vestibule but to a dark, steeply angled, narrow corridor. Surprise registered on Donna's face but the Doctor did not even blink as he began a rapid descent.

"That's not what it looks like from the outside," Donna hissed at him, matching his hurried steps through the corridor which dripped with ice cold water.

"Perception filter," he said, leading the way by the light of a torch which he produced from the depths of his overcoat pocket, "Not a very sophisticated one, just a static image which is all you need if no-one gets too close. This smacks of Torchwood."

Donna looked up at the sound of distaste in his tone.

"Stolen alien technology being hacked and pressed into use," he continued, "Very Torchwood. Which makes this all the more confusing because according to a friend of mine Torchwood doesn't do this kind of thing any more."

"Where are we going?"

"Well, in human terms I'm following my gut."

Donna frowned, "And in Time Lord terms?"

He shoved his hands in to his pockets, "It's complicated."

She laughed at him, his public school master swagger, coat billowing behind him, "Sounds like a Facebook status."

He stopped with a jolt and Donna walked into his back. She cursed and took a step backwards as he swung round.

"Can you feel that?" he asked, raising out his hand and peering down at them, "It's making my hairs stand on end."

She resisted the opportunity to make fun of his hair style and instead listened intently, trying to experience whatever it was that the Doctor was sensing but after a few seconds she had to confess to feeling nothing.

"It's a change in the harmonics, the vibrations of time. We've walked through something, like a… wall, or a pocket of disturbance."

Squeezing passed Donna, he pressed the torch into her hand and took three purposeful steps back in the opposite direction, his hands now brushing the walls of the passageway. On the third step he stopped and turned back, his mouth ajar and a look of surprised excitement on his face, eyebrows raised, forehead frowning, lips forming a silent 'oh'. His outstretched hands shook as they brushed opposite sides of the passage, the tendons visible as his splayed fingers grasped at the invisible force.

"There it is," he whispered, "Sends shivers down my spine, like little electrodes."

He reversed another two paces. Paused. Stepped forward again.

"It's a wall," he said conclusively shaking out his fingers and flicking unseen energy from his body in a strange little dance, "Well, not now. But it was. There was a barrier here. Oh… ooh but I felt this before. The first time when we were in the chamber and found the Colonel. Only it was stronger then, it made me nauseous."

His face had lost its enthusiasm as a particularly nasty realisation awoke in his mind. "That's what killed her. She was just unlucky and stood in exactly the wrong spot as the wall descended. She was cut in two, divided into two different time zones."

Donna felt a little sick. "That's terrible."

"Yes," he agreed, "There would have been no warning. She didn't stand a chance."

"Could that happen to us?" she asked with obvious hesitation.

"Oh, no!" he stepped forward again, bravado bolstering his walk, making him bounce in his shoes. "It's highly unlikely. The odds must be… well… probably… a million to one… or…"

He withered under Donna's reproach filled gaze. She had been right, recent companions had been younger and easier to convince. Donna had loved a liar, and had learnt from the experience. It was almost impossible for him to lie to her directly, even for her own protection.

"It is possible," he admitted and squeezed her arm, "But I'll do everything I can not to let it happen."

His companion cocked her head to the right and blustered, "You better, because my mother will chase you from one side of the universe to another if you bring me back in pieces."

The Doctor looked at Donna's pale face and decided it was time to move on.

When the passageway opened into an intersection Donna breathed an audible sigh of relief and let go of the Doctor's leading hand. They turned in opposite directions, gathering their bearings, breathing hard through the musty damp air.

"Which way now?" Donna asked, gesturing to the three open tunnels that greeted them.

Dropping to his knees the Doctor examined the dirty, scuffed floor and looked straight ahead, then to the first tunnel on the right. Wheel tracks and footfall were predominantly in those directions. With tentative nostrils he sniffed the air, then pointed forwards.

"Three people came that way recently," he said, standing up and brushing away the dust from his knees, "But only two went back."

His companion looked at him, a mixture of awe and disgust evident in her expression. "What are you? Some kind of alien blood hound?"

"It's just a trick I learnt when I spent a few years with a tribe of hunters on a little planet on the other side of Kasterborous," he said with a small smile of remembrance. "I was avoiding my wife. Turned out ten years was too long."

Donna blinked, "You left your wife for ten years? I'm surprised you weren't made to regenerate when you got home."

He gestured to his own body with both hands and a quizzical expression, "I'm a Time Lord, remember? Ten years really isn't long to us. Think of it more like a fortnight in Lanzarote without the kids."

"You left your wife alone, with the children, for ten years?" Every word from Donna's lips sounded like an accusation, "Blimey, I'd have had something to say about that."

"Well…" he paused, a smirk itching to turn into a grin. "She did have something to say and then we had making up to do. My 11th child was born not long after."

Donna stared at him, "How many kids did you have?"

He hesitated and closed his eyes bringing back the memories of his lost family with caution and a protective frame around his hearts. "Jenny was my fourteenth."

From the first corridor on the left came the sound of a door slam, the noise echoing down the tunnels in an eerie repeat. In unison Donna and the Doctor swung to face the direction of the noise and with a renewed burst of enthusiasm the Time Lord began to run down the new tunnel his companion on his heels.

They had run no more than forty steps when they came to a doorway, the door itself extracted and leaning against the tunnel wall. A bright light shone through the opening and the sounds of movement came from inside.

"Hello?" the Doctor called ahead as he stepped over the threshold, "Anyone in there?"

There was a click, and the Doctor stopped dead in his tracks, blocking Donna from entering the room. Donna had only heard a gun being cocked twice in her life but it was unmistakable and she froze on the spot, her hand touching the Doctor's arm.

"Who are you?" a man's voice came from behind the torch which was now pointing at the door. It was impossible to see anything beyond the glare but his accent suggested an Eastern European origin.

The Doctor's voice was full of cheer, "Oh, don't mind me. I'm just a stranger popping by, found and open door and thought I'd explore…"

"Your name. Now."

Through the glare the Doctor saw a gun being levelled at his head.

"I'm the Doctor."

The other man did not speak but he moved, bringing the torch out of eye level and walking towards them, gun still raised. His stocky silhouette held a position just out of the Doctor's reach as he paused, observing him.

"And the one behind you?" he said. "I can see your fingers on his arm, woman."

"Don't you 'woman' me!" Donna exclaimed, pushing the Doctor sideways so that she was no longer shielded by his body. "Look at you with your gun, pretending to be the big man! Is that what Torchwood is? A bunch of boys pointing guns at aliens and knicking technology you don't understand? Your doors off its hinges, this place is a dump, and you Torchwood idiots have done something ridiculous that you don't understand. So how about you dredge your brain and look up the term 'Doctor'. Show some respect and put that weapon away before someone gets hurt."

Neither the Doctor nor the other man moved, and the seconds passed in a slow, scared silence. Finally a burst of gruff laughter shot from the man's throat and the sound of the gun being un-cocked echoed through the room. The man stepped backwards and an overhead light turned on.

"You," the man said, pointing at Donna and grinning through his thick, black beard, "You are very funny. I like you. Him, not so much. I have learnt my history Doctor, your exploits are well documented."

Donna offered the man a broad smile and extended her hand, "Donna Noble."

He took her hand and shook it before lifting her fingers gently in his hand and bending to kiss them, "Darijus Matas, at your service, ma'am."

"Okay," the Doctor interrupted before Donna questioned Darijus's use of 'ma'am'. "Pleasantries over? Now how about you tell me exactly what have you done to Time?"


	5. Chapter 5

"I have no idea what you are talking about."

Donna was inclined to believe Darijus' denial, but the Doctor approached the man with a look of ferocity that made even his companion quake.

"Time!" the Doctor spat, "Someone is twisting it, turning it into a piece of plasticine and bending in ways I don't even want to conceive. And here you are, Torchwood. Sat in the middle of it. Excuse me if I draw some rudimentary conclusions here."

Darijus shrugged his shoulders, his manner calm, his voice mocking, "You blame Torchwood for this?"

"Your people have a track record of trying to destroy the human race."

"And you have a record of running off in the aftermath of disaster. This is not a good trait for a Doctor." Darijus turned his back on the pair and resumed searching through the desk drawer, "A good Doctor aids the sick, eases the pain of dying. You? I have read the files, Doctor, many, many times. You are the cause of much chaos and destruction, leaving much devastation behind you."

"Oi!" Donna bellowed, placing herself between the two men, hands on her hips, eyes blazing, "How about you two stop throwing insults at each other and try an actual dialogue?"

The Doctor opened his mouth to reply but snapped it shut again seeing Donna's warning glare. Darijus opened his hands in a gesture of peace and continued his search.

"What happened here?" Donna asked, "This room looks like it's been through an earthquake."

"Power surge," Darijus answered without looking up. "There was an error in a computer programme and it caused a huge power drain across the city, this base was the focal point."

"How many of you are there here?" Donna asked, eyeing the Doctor who appeared to be pouting.

Darijus sighed, "We were five, I believe we are now three." He paused, and took an envelope from the drawer, smoothing the battered edges and waving it in Donna's direction. "This is a letter from our cleric, Arjun, to his parents in the event of his death. I will ensure it reaches them."

"I'm sorry," Donna was sincere and Darijus nodded his appreciation.

The Doctor's eyes held remorse, "And the other, your commander perhaps? Margaret Garde?"

"How do you know?" Darijus looked at the Doctor directly for the first time.

"We found her, outside. What was left of her."

Darijus studied the Doctor, considering his words. "We looked outside but found only parts of her. I have performed an initial autopsy, there is no blade that could deliver an injury such as this."

"She was in a different time period."

"Ridiculous!" Darijus objected, "This is impossible."

"What year do you think this is?" Donna asked, continuing when Darijus refused to answer, "I'm serious. What's the date?"

"June 11th 2008." Darijus' response was stiff. "Spain beat Russia in the the football yesterday."

The Doctor's eyes mellowed, "That match won't happen for another one hundred and seven years. Come outside if you don't believe me. Smell the smoke in the air, see the changes in the land."

"We cannot get outside," he scowled at the Doctor, "There is an invisible wall. We could not pass through it."

Donna and the Doctor exchanged a mutual look of worry before the Doctor spun on the spot heading back the way they had come, back to the surface. Darijus and Donna sprinted after him, Darijus grabbing a backpack and radio before bolting out of the door.

At speed it took only a few minutes to reach the entrance. The Doctor had beaten them and when Darijus and Donna hammered through the doorway breathing hard, they saw him scanning the area with his sonic screwdriver.

"Show me!" the Doctor demanded when he realised Darijus had joined them and followed him across the room until they came to a stop a few meters short of the open door through which the early morning sun shone.

Darijus raised his hand and pressed against an invisible force, his fingers making the air ripple like jelly. Mimicking the action the Doctor found his hand passed through the wall with no effect.

"Donna," he called, looking back over his shoulder. "Come over here a minute, will you?"

Still puffing from the run Donna crossed to the Doctor stepping round him and looking at Darijus, whose jaw had dropped as if he had just witnessed the impossible.

"You can both pass through," he said in a hushed tone. "Yet we are trapped."

The sonic screwdriver whirled and fizzed as the Doctor scanned first the thin air, then Donna, Darijus and finally himself.

"This doesn't make sense," he admitted, "There's nothing physiologically different between the two of you, and through the sonic is picking up something, it's not a barrier in the classic sense."

He pocketed the device and stepped into the invisible wall with his hands outstretched, feeling his way. As he took another step forward, his skin prick with discomfort and goosebumps broke out along his arms, under his shirt.

"Ooh, there it is again," he looked back at Donna. "Just like in the tunnel."

"But how can we walk through it and Darijus can't?"

"Good question," the Doctor replied, "Not sure. Darijus? Just walk towards me, very slowly. If it hurts stop and back out."

Darijus walked forward resisting the urge to stretch out his own hands in protection. As his face met with the wall there was a shimmer and the air seemed to bend around him, sucking him in. He took another step, pushing against the unseen force, sweat breaking out on his face. The air turned into a thick, transparent gel that enveloped him, closing around his face and sucking him into the wall. Darijus raised his hands through the gel in slow motion bringing his fingers to his face a look of horror filling his eyes. Within the wall the Doctor felt the discomfort intensify, something sharp twisted in his sternum as though he had been stabbed with a rapier.

"Darijus, go back!" he called, "You're fighting Time, you can't win!"

Darijus' hand was caught mid motion, clawing at his mouth and nose. His lips were turning blue, eyes bulging. The Doctor pushed towards him, his own movements slowed, distortions of time wallowing around him. Donna leapt forwards and grabbing the backpack which Darijus wore, pulled backwards as hard as she could. Yanked out of the invisible barrier the man fell to the floor, gasping for breath. Donna knelt over him, a hand resting on his shoulder, repeating over and over he was fine.

Crashing to her side came the Doctor. Released from the thickening barrier of time as Darijus was extracted he stumbled, spun and landed on the floor beside Donna, a look of wonder on his face mixed with a tinge of nauseated green.

"That… was… amazing," he gasped in awe, "I've never experienced anything like it. It's like… like time thickening… making a barrier, creating a lock. Allowing certain people passed and keeping others contain."

Darijus rolled over beside him and scowled, "I am so terribly glad you enjoyed the experience. I feel as though I should have died in another minute."

The sonic was in the Doctor's hand again, scanning Darijus with interest.

"Fascinating," he whispered, "You actually aged in that short time you were there."

Donna caught his eye and he realised his words may not be well received, "No, no, don't panic. Only by a few months, nothing that will create any major long term damage. But I wouldn't advise it again."

"I did not suggest it in the first place," Darijus complained. "But at least you can leave without hinderance. Why don't you go now? If we are lost, then so be it. A lady as beautiful as Donna should not be trapped here unnecessarily."

Blood shot through Donna's face as she turned a bright shade of red.

"We can leave at any time," said the Doctor, bouncing back up to his feet and ignoring Donna's embarrassment. "How about we find your other colleagues and see what they've been up to?"

Darijus descended with them to the joining chamber pointed to the corridor straight ahead.

"Go down there," he said, his voice gruff. "You will find Ellie and Max in the far room, if they have not killed each other yet."

"Aren't you coming?" Donna asked.

Darijus shook his head. "I managed to get the generator working, but it is using far more fuel than it should be. I must look at it."

"Do yourself a favour and turn it off," the Doctor told him, "You're feeding whatever is causing this problem. The less energy it has, the better."

"I'll go with you, if you like," Donna volunteered with a smile, shaking her hair free and looking coyly at Darijus.

"Be careful," the Doctor insisted with a roll of his eyes, "Darijus, if anything happens to Donna I will hold you personally responsible."

"It is not as though I can abduct her and take her back to Lithuania," Darijus joked as he took Donna by the arm and lead her back towards the office where they had met.

"I mean it!" the Doctor called after them, "Turn that generator off. There's more at stake here than three humans stuck in a time lock."

Darijus' chest swelled with pride as he escorted Donna along the corridor. He walked tall and straight, leading the way. Her hand nestled in the crook of his arm and she followed half a step behind as he guided her through the narrow passageway. Donna's face glowed, and she fanned air at her flushed skin. There was something about Darijus and his gentlemanly conduct that made her heart pound.

"You travel with a dangerous man," Darijus commented as they entered the generator room, guiding her to the left and he moved to the right.

"He's all right," Donna replied, "When you get to know him."

"He is not your lover then?"

Donna laughed, "Oh my God you're direct, aren't you? No, he's not my lover. I'm not mating with any aliens, thank you very much!"

His back to her Darijus' lips curled into a huge grin. "This is good. I would not like him as competition in your affections. He is too pretty."

A shriek of laughter erupted from Donna and she slapped her hand over her mouth, trying to salvage a modicum of dignity. "Oh don't tell him that! He thinks he's handsome. I've seen him preening that sticky up hair of his."

He slipped on some heavy duty gloves and opened the control panel on the front of the generator. The generator's hum filled the room with a low level vibration. Pressing the shutdown button he paused and waited but nothing happened.

"Strange," he said, "Donna, would you come here for a moment, please?"

She crossed the room and looked at the control panel with a frown. "You could try pressing the big red button."

"I already did," Darijus laughed and pointed at three indicators on the panel. "Watch these lights for me. I am going to disengage with the lever in the corner."

He moved to the left and placed his gloved hands around a large metal lever. Pushing with all his strength he could not make it shift at all.

"Nothing happening here," Donna reported and reached out her hand to press the shutdown button herself.

There was a crack and an electrical charge knocked Donna away, making her stumble and cry out. Before she could process what had happened, she found herself caught in Darijus' huge arms as he swept her into his chest, and away from danger. Stunned she held her position for a moment, her face brushing against his woolen jumper, her arms pinned to her side as he had gathered her into safety.

"Are you all right?" he asked, his rich brown eyes looked down with such tenderness that Donna found herself drowning in their darkness.

"Fine," she gasped, her face flushing more. "What the hell was that?"

With an easy grace Darijus lifted Donna back to her feet and released her, his hands hovering a little at her side until she found her own balance. Flustered, Donna tapped his guiding hands away and turned back to look at the generator.

Darijus stepped away, raising his hand to the control panel and meeting another invisible wall. Turning back to Donna he offered her a quirky smile of surprise.

"I believe the generator does not wish to be turned off."

With his companion out of sight the Doctor let a low pained sigh escape from his lungs. Standing still in the centre of the tunnel junction he hung his head inhaled long and slow before rolling his neck in a circle and running his hand through his hair. There was something about the barrier, and Darijus' presence in it, that had disrupted the elements of time. Each twist of the wormhole, every brush through the invisible walls made his skin prickle and his mind reel, his connection to the universe torn by the changes.

Shaking tension from his body like a dog jumping from a pool the Doctor began a trek down the next passageway feeling for any changes in the atmosphere. As he walked he watched, waiting for Darijus to cut the power, looking for anything out of the ordinary. It was a long corridor, with smaller tunnels and rooms running off each side at hundred meter intervals. The floor sloped downhill and the deeper he went underground the colder it became.

Here the brick tunnels were whitewashed in a careless fashion, globs of white paint dangled like stalactites and water seeped through the brick dripping into puddles on the floor. At the far end of the tunnel a light shone with more intensity creating a pocket of brightness. From the room a grating sound emanated, and electrical pops mixed with a frantic voice, the words too indistinct to make out. Breaking into a run the Doctor hurtled down the tunnel, sliding through the door at the end and crashing into someone inside.

The Doctor and the stranger fell in a tangled heap of arms and legs the former finding his feet more quickly and bouncing back into action. Across the room a woman stood, frozen to her computer. Her hand raised over the keyboard, head turned, looking back at him, dark brown eyes wide and full of fear. He approached with open hands, keeping his focus on her face. She did not move, she did not even blink.

"Stop!" the shout came from behind him. "Don't touch her!"

He turned back with a broad smile and the offer of a hand. "You must be Max. Hello, I'm the Doctor."

Max stared at him, "How do you know who I am?"

He gestured to the corridor, "Darijus said I'd find you and Ellie down here, and you look more like a Max than an Ellie. I've come to help."

Max clambered upright and took the Doctor's outstretched hand, "Doctor, I am very, very pleased to meet you. Yes, I'm Max. Max Bryant."

Retracting his hand from Max's firm, desperate grip, he turned back to look at Ellie who had not moved so much as a millimetre. Like a mime artist he traced the edge of the new wall with the palm of his hand, fingers extended, watching as the transparent containment field rippled, feeling the pricks of pain piercing his skin but not reacting to it.

"This is recent," he said, turning back to Max who was watching every movement.

Max nodded, "It happened after the power came back on."

"I need to know what happened, all of it. Be precise."

"I don't know," Max's voice was plaintive, "We… stole… some software from another Torchwood base and somehow it activated. We didn't even know what it was supposed to do. Our instructions were to acquire, analyse and develop. It was Ellie's job… and I suppose we were bickering as usual so her mind wasn't focused."

"You stole software from your own people?" he frowned, "You lot really aren't to be trusted."

"We didn't want to," Max argued, voice rising. "Colonel Garde isn't someone who takes no for an answer."

The Doctor turned back to Ellie and made a thorough scan of the area.

"Well on the plus side she isn't dead," he moved closer, trying to view the contents of the computer screen. "But she is stuck on the other side of a time barrier of some sort. It's very clever. Haven't figured it out myself yet."

He stared at her again, noticing her eyes closing a fraction, mid blink.

"She's in a pocket of protected time that seems to be running slower than the time period we are in. I wonder if she is locked to this period, or if we shift again will she be shifted with it?" As he mused the Doctor leant forward, pushing himself into the invisible wall to read the screen. As his chest hit the wall he felt the now familiar pain needling his bones. When he had read enough he pulled back with a gasp and a rapid shake of his head.

"Are you okay?" Max asked, but the Doctor ignored the question.

"That is very clever," he admired, "Genius. And mostly human. Who wrote this software? What's the point of origin?"

"Toshiko Sato, she's based at another Torchwood site."

The Doctor frowned, paced, and drummed his fingers on his thigh, "I know that name... Oh, yes, Slitheen in Downing Street. I suppose it makes sense she's one of you lot. That's a shame. I liked her."

Max blocked the Doctor's path, "We are not all like Yvonne Hartman. Don't judge us by her standards."

Looking down at the hand on his arm and the earnest look on Max's face the Doctor frowned, nodded, and turned away to look back at Ellie.

"How long has she been in there?"

"A little less than an hour."

The Doctor walked around the computer workstation and observing everything and testing the edges of the wall like a mime artist, feeling his way. Structurally complete from floor to ceiling it hugged close to the desk, making it impossible to step into the space. A power cable from the computer dangled over the back of the desk and into an extension lead, which was buried under the rubble.

"Where does this plug in?" he asked as he stooped to pick up the cable.

Max strode over to a socket on the other side of the room and, before the Doctor had a chance to call out a warning, reached out to pull it from the wall. As Max's fingers gripped the plug, there was an electrical crack and a flash of energy shot from the socket shooting into Max with a light as bright as a pylon struck by lightning. With a scream of pain Max flew into the air, body arching with the force of the blow until the far wall acted as a solid safety net, and Max slumped to the floor, eyes closed.

The Doctor threw himself into a baseball slide, skidding across the room on his side and landing at Max's feet. All around them the room vibrated, the deep sound resonating against metal, and a high pitch hiss of energy was rising through every electrical outlet in the room. Swinging Max onto his shoulder without pausing to check for a pulse he staggered through the door and broke into a run.

"Donna!"

His companion heard him before she saw him, his raw voice echoing through the passageway. Exchanging looks of concern Donna and Darijus started running, their fast steps clattering on the brick floor. The brighter light of the junction cavern drew them closer, the sound of someone stumbling, then falling heavily, pushed their pace on. Behind the sound of their boots hitting bricks both could hear a low, thunderous roar building in the earth around them.

They met at Grand Central, the bright light dazzling the pair as they sought the Doctor who was on his knees, breathing hard, with Max still flung over his shoulders.

"Help Max," he urged, dropping his shoulders and allowing Max's unmoving body to fall into Darijus' waiting arms.

The medic's fingers found a weak pulse, and he pulled back Max's eyelids without sparing a second to look at the Doctor.

"What happened?" he demanded.

"Electric shock. Tired to pull the plug on the computer," the Doctor answered, staggering to his feet with Donna's help.

Donna's stare searched the Doctor for any sign of harm and, catching her look, he shook his head, leaning on her a little as he calmed his breath.

"We couldn't turn off the generator," Donna told him, "Darijus said the power drain from it was getting worse."

Beside them Darijus scooped Max up, Max's light frame no challenge for his muscled form. "I need to get Max to the sickbay."

The Doctor shook his head. "We need to get out of here. Whatever that programme is it's out of our control. It's made a wall around it, I can't touch it."

"Max needs medical attention now," Darijus argued and pushed passed them, heading along a different tunnel towards the sickbay.

Donna was a few steps behind and as they reached a fork in the passageway, the Doctor stopped her. His hands on her shoulders, his brown eyes earnest and afraid.

"Donna, go back to the TARDIS."

"You said it wasn't any safer in there," her tone suspicious as she tried to shake off his grip, "How is that going to be better?"

"I don't want you getting stuck inside one of these time zones," he tried to to lead her towards the exit shaft but she resisted and pushed back, moving them to the edge of another passage they had not yet explored.

"And that can't happen in the TARDIS?"

"Honestly, I don't know. But it's the safest place in the vicinity."

Donna shook her head and prised his fingers from her right shoulder. "You didn't invite me on your jollies across space and time to leave me in the TARDIS every time it gets a bit dangerous."

A low rumble gathered around their feet, rattling the walls making dust and soil fall all around them. White painted bricks showered them like snowflakes as the vibrations shifted the cement, cracking and twisting as the surrounding earth moved. They stumbled into a run, looking for shelter. The Doctor dragged Donna into the nearest, narrow, passageway as the vibrations grew stronger, hoping that the tight arch structure would be stronger than the wider tunnels. Vibrations hit them as a physical force and Donna grabbed the Doctor arm as, impaled with a sudden tremendous pain, his knees buckled and he lurched forward.

Electricity charged up the tunnel, running in rivers along the ducting in the ceiling, sparking as it met trickles of water, leaping from outlet to outlet. Gasping in agony the Doctor clung to Donna, wrapping his coat around them both as best he could and pulling her to the floor.

"Be small," he choked, "Tiny."

Burying her head in his chest Donna felt the Doctor's grip grow tighter as he pulled her closer, and she realised he was shielding her from the energy above them. His arms wrapped around her back and gripped her sweater as a spike of pain seared through his chest making him dig his fingers into his companion's arms. He cried out in pain and Donna pulled him tighter still.

"Sonic!"

The Doctor's voice rasped in her ear and she fumbled in his inside pocket finding the device mixed in with a hundred other items.

"Turn it on and throw it," his grip was growing weaker and she felt him shudder with the effort.

With shaking fingers Donna turned on the screwdriver, its pale blue light glowing in her cupped hand.

"Throw it." His voice was a whisper now.

Not knowing which direction she was pointing in Donna reached her hand out of the protective ball and through the sonic screwdriver as far as she could down the tunnel. She heard it clatter against the bricks as it fell somewhere close by.

There was a blast as the electricity from the roof hit the sonic. The explosion shook the tunnel sending bricks tumbling from the ancient cement that held them. Dust clouds choked the oxygen out of the air and Donna breathed through the material of the Doctor's suit, noticing for the first time how soft it was on her skin. In their ball on the floor Donna clung to the Doctor who's back arched in pain as the explosion started then collapsed into Donna's arms, shaking. The electricity blew out the remaining lights and the earth seemed to move beneath them, turning from brick to soft, jellied mud.

After what felt like hours the dust settled. All Donna could hear were the harsh, pained breaths of the Doctor and a loud dripping of water into a pool somewhere nearby. Carefully Donna lifted her head from the Doctor's chest and pulled back the coat. There was no light at all and the darkness felt endless. Cold, wet mud beneath them soaked into their clothes. Time had shifted again, Donna was sure of that.

She felt her way up the Doctor's arms, to his neck and up to his chin, cupping his face in her hands and smoothing one cheek with her thumb.

"Doctor?" she urged him to respond, "Don't go passing out on me here."

He groaned and Donna felt his mouth open a little as he took short, uncomfortable breaths.

"It's okay," she felt him twist, trying to fight his way onto his back and helped, looping her arm under his shoulders and heaving, "It's all right. I've got you."

"Donna?" his voice was hoarse.

"I'm here," her voice seemed to reassure him and he relaxed against her, his back against her chest, her arm around him.

"Time shift?"

"Yeah," her reply was sour, "I'd never have noticed."

A sound crossed between a laugh and a groan filled the tunnel.

"Could be worse," Donna mused, as she listened to his breathing ease.

"How?"

"One of us could have been zapped by the electricity instead of your sonic."

She felt him nod and start to take his own weight in his lower back, straightening and leaning forward.

"I can't see," he said, his tone flat.

"Neither can I, dumbo," she replied. "I don't think there's any electricity in the tunnel whenever we are. There's no floor either. I hope the TARDIS knows a good dry cleaners."

"We must have gone back in time," the Doctor stood up in slow motion, sliding in the mud and holding on to Donna's hand for balance. She felt him sway and then steady himself before pulling her to her feet. "Before the tunnels were lined."

"What do we do now?" Donna asked, linking her hand with his and feeling him apply a little reassuring pressure to the grasp.

"Well we can only go one way," he declared as his spare hand probed the blackness around them. "In this time period the tunnel isn't complete. One entrance, one exit."

"Great," his companion muttered and looked into the dark in every direction and could see nothing at all.

"I need some air," he said, the edge of his voice strained with either pain or tiredness, Donna could not tell which but in the dark he sounded older, more worn. "We can't do anything from here. We need access to that computer."

"Lead on then," Donna told him, hoping his alien eyes could see more than her human ones in the pitch black.

Mud filled their boots as they trudged through the darkness. It soaked in through the seams of Donna's expensive leather knee highs and filled the Doctor's Converse from the top. Donna's jumper sagged from the weight of the water absorbed from the floor and wet jeans clung to her in a second, icy skin. The cold ate at their flesh, turning them colder with every step until Donna's teeth began to chatter.

Water ran alongside them and in places showered from the roof. It dripped on their faces and down their necks at first producing shrieks from Donna but, as the occurrence became more frequent and the cold crushed her spirit, even the expletives trickled away to nothing. Progress was painful and slow. With no concept of distance or time Donna steeled herself as best she could and conserved energy by not speaking. The Doctor tried for a time to provide a running, one sided conversation but eventually even he fell silent.

"D...D...Doctor," she stuttered, "I can't...t...f..ff..feel my f..feet."

Turning, he fumbled for her hands, bringing them close to his lips and blowing on them, massaging life back into her skin. Her hands were deathly chilled and even her breath seemed to shiver. He rubbed her arms with rough, vigorous movements, then pulled her close, aware only now that she was soaked to the skin. Slipping off his trench coat he wrapped it over her shoulders and helped her struggle into it. With her clothes already sodden it would do little to make her warm, but it would break the wind later.

The tunnel was not wide enough to walk two abreast so the Doctor lead but his hand held Donna's tightly, transferring a little warmth between them. Each time they slipped they held each other upright, avoiding falling into the mire as much as they could. There was a dank odour in the air and the distinctive smell of sewage offended their senses as the atmosphere grew more cold and damp. In the pitch black they were guided by their ears and by the sensation of the mud under the soles of their boots. Sometimes solid and filled with rocks that caught their numb feet, making them stumble. Other patches of earth were thick and wet, like trench mud in war movies, and further patches still were boggy puddles, ankle deep, crusted on the top with ice which cracked as they stepped on it.

"We're nearly there," the Doctor told his companion as she slipped again, landing on her knees in a soupy mess before he could catch her. "I can see a light up ahead."

"It better be a pub with a fire," she grumbled back with precious little enthusiasm, "I'm so cold I'm not sure I have toes anymore, just blocks of ice."

They stumbled out of the tunnel into moonlight, to be greeted by the stench of effluent and a strong, cold east wind that ripped through their wet clothes, plastering the mud soaked material to their skin. The moon was almost full, its likeness reflected in a wide strip of black water a few meters in front of them. The tunnel was cut into a high bank and rough steps were dug into the earth, uneven stagings blocked up by crude wooden slats. They staggered to the top, Donna stumbling over her frozen feet and the Doctor bolstering her with regular pushes from behind. As they reached pinnacle of the climb, the sky darkened and spots of rain brushed against their exposed faces.

With the moon almost covered they could see virtually nothing again, and they huddled together, walking wrapped arm in arm, trying to preserve heat. Twice the Doctor hesitated, his step faltering but his companion steadied him and urged him to keep moving. Speaking was an effort, thoughts hard to articulate as the freezing air whipped through their hair and words were lost on the wind. As sleet pounded the earth, the Doctor pointed ahead of them to the hulk of an old boat that lay rotting on marshy land and with no energy left to run they pushed onwards only falling into the comparative shelter of the damaged hold when their clothes were saturated with water and their shoes oozed with every step.

Wooden slats, weak with years of rotting, creaked as they collapsed to the floor. Frozen to the core Donna stifled a sob, sniffing hard and dragging a raw, numb hand across her eyes. Hearing the hitch of her breath the Doctor reached out into the dark and hugged her without speaking, holding her until he felt her pull back her composure.

"I'm sitting on something," Donna's voice sounded fragile in the dark. She shifted sideways, grasping with numb hands at an old oil cloth that was wrapped around something cylindrical. With clumsy fingers she passed it to the Doctor, almost dropping it before he gathered the item into his own icy hands and opened the rag inch by inch.

"Oh brilliant!" he exclaimed, pulling Donna close again and kissing her forehead, "Candles!"

"Seriously?" Donna was dubious.

She found one of the items shoved under her nose and she pushed him away with some of her usual vigour.

"Smell that tallow," she could hear the grin in his voice, "I bet I can find a match in one of these pockets…"

Donna's teeth chattered as she listened to the Doctor scraping and tutting as he searched his pockets for a light. After a few minutes there was the rough scratching sound of a match struck and the fatty candle spat into life with a yellow glow. In the breeze from the door the candle danced and threatened to go out but the Doctor used his body as a shield and held the candle close, illuminating their faces from below and creating long shadows that rippled with the flickering light.

"That's a bit better," the grin on his face not concealing his drawn features and the dark patches around his eyes. "Are you okay?"

"Freezing," Donna replied, feeling exhaustion bubbling into tears again and desperate not to let them fall. "You?"

"Never better," he lied, "Let's get to the back of hold, away from the door," he helped Donna back to her feet and they wobbled across the curved floor guided by the meagre light.

At the far end of the boat's hold stood a small brazier and a stack of wood, all old and dry and in perfect condition for burning. Behind that lay another piece of oilskin, larger this time, and wrapped with rope.

"Smugglers," the Doctor announced as he used the candle to start a small fire. "They must use this as a hideout. It's not been used in a while though, there's been no way of getting up the river this winter. I expect the Thames has been frozen solid until recently."

Donna fumbled with the rope surrounding the oilskin seeing now that her skin was red and raw. The package was large, solid and rectangular, a trunk of sorts, protected against the environment by two pieces of cloth. There was a broken lock on the chest, snapped off by a heavy blow, and though the lid was heavy with the Doctor's aid Donna flipped it open and they both sat back on their heels exchanging glances of wonder and confusion.


	6. Chapter 6

Inside the chest there there were several packs of ship’s biscuits double wrapped in paper, pieces of dried meat and a flask sat next to them. Underneath this horde were two rolls of cloths, bundled up with care and wrapped in woven cotton sheets, dusty but serviceable.  On top of it all was an envelope which the Doctor picked up and held in a tentative hand before breaking the red wax seal and opening the page.   

_I believe you may be in need of this._

The note was brief with no clues to the past nor the future, the scruffily handwritten message signed by Jack, with a kiss at the bottom. The Doctor leant back against the boat’s hold and let his head drop backwards in exhaustion, a low chuckle rising from his chest. 

“How did this get here?” Donna asked as she lifted the packages of clothes from the trunk, setting them on one of the oilcloths to keep dry as she unwrapped the thin towels for use. 

“Time,” the Doctor replied, not moving. “It’s a funny thing. Especially where time travellers are concerned.” 

Shrugging off the Doctor’s sodden overcoat Donna placed it over the lid of the trunk to dry. Using one of the sheets as a towel to dry her face and hair she shunted over to the Doctor, nudging him and placing the other cotton sheet in his hand. 

“Dry up,” she told him in a fair impersonation of her mother’s authoritative tone. A deep sense of unease at the Doctor’s stillness churning in her stomach. 

With evident effort he lifted his head and looked down at the towel as if waiting for further instruction. Donna stared at him. Catching her eye and he stirred into action, copying Donna’s action as if every movement were a struggle.

Though the towels were rough they were effective, simultaneously drying the skin and stimulating blood flow. Both sets of clothes were for working men of the period, beige linen jackets over long brown waistcoats which covered rough shirts that tied at the neck. The trousers, like the rest of the attire, were brown, and they finished just below the knee, long wool stocking covering the lower leg. Donna was too cold to object and when she tried to recall what women wore in the olden’ days she decided that the hose and waistcoat were far more practical and warm. Wrapped in one pack of clothes was a smaller, paper bag with another note scrawled in what looked like felt tip pen. 

_Donna Noble_

She stared at it and picked it up with a mixture of fascination and trepidation. Inside were twenty first century female undergarments, an attractive set. Her eyes bulged. 

“How the hell did he get the right size?” Donna asked, waving the bag at the Doctor. 

“Oh, well… Jack is very observant, and he wouldn’t want to disappoint. You’ll see what I mean, when you meet him.” A small, genuine, smile formed on his cracked lips and he turned away to afford Donna some privacy while he unrolled the other oilskins to find a familiar style of navy coat, longer than his old one but double breasted with deep pockets inside. He slipped the coat over his shoulders sinking as the weight caught him off guard. 

“Well, that’s heavier than I remember,” he said with a smile and turned back to help Donna clamber into the beige linen jacket, neatening her collar with a gentle brush of his hand. 

For a while they sat on the floor, warming their still numb fingers on the heat from the brazier and nibbling at the ship’s biscuits. They had found a small kettle, two tin mugs, and a muslin stuffed with tea leaves at the bottom of the box. From a leak near the broken hull Donna collected water in the pot and they drank black tea in silence, leaning against each other, huddled to the brazier, staring into the flames. 

“What year is it?” Donna asked after a while, feeling more human as sensation returned to her feet and hands. 

“I’m not sure,” he admitted, a dark look clouding the Doctor’s forehead. “From the clothes, the provisions… the mid seventeen hundreds.” 

Donna looked at him with concern, “You always know when we are.” 

“Sorry,” he sighed and closed his eyes. “All this being dragged through Time… I’ve lost my internal compass.” 

Donna’s warmed hand found his. “Are you okay, spaceman?” 

The forced smile he tried to raise almost reached his lips, and he hung his head running his other hand through his hair, massaging his scalp and the tension under his skin. The world was fading before his eyes and a deep sickness in the pit of his stomach made him reel. 

“It’s a strange sensation,” he admitted, “I suppose it’s like having one too many beers and leaving your stomach at the top of a rollercoaster…. Only this rollercoaster is several miles long and I think I was drinking a pan galactic gargle blaster. I can’t get my bearings.” 

His words slurred and as Donna looked up, she saw the Doctor blinking, his gaze lacking focus. 

“Donna… I’m sorry… I.. can’t…” 

Dropping the dregs of her tea on the floor she caught him as he toppled sideways landing, for the most part, on her lap. He tried to resist the darkness, the strain etched on his face, but his eyes rolled backwards and Donna eased him into a more comfortable position, cradling his head on her lap.  Donna had nursed drunken, comatose, mates often enough to know when trying to keep someone awake was a losing battle. Instead she held him as he drifted out of consciousness, whispering the words of a lullaby she didn't know she remembered.

On the hull of the ship the rain drove on, battering the sides in waves of ice and wind.  To Donna, alone with the unconscious Time Lord, the night felt endless. Though she had been reluctant to release the Doctor from her protection, the brazier had burnt low and the tea was long since cold. In the interests of self preservation, she slid him to the floor and collected more water before stocking up the fire. By design or luck the smoke found its way out of the hold by a crack in the wood and though not warm by any standards the temperature was survivable. In the cold dark Donna curled up next to the Doctor, covering them both with the oilskin coats and dozed fitfully, listening to the storm outside. 

The rain stopped long before dawn and the clear sky gave way to more frost. The drop in temperature send a chill along Donna’s spin and making her huddle closer to the fire. There was no sun, sea mist rolling in just as the first cracks of light showed in the East. It wasn’t until it was full daylight that the Doctor stirred, swimming in and out of consciousness against his will, the fight visible in his eyes as he struggled to pull himself clear. At his side Donna smoothed his hair with slow, gentle movements professing a calm through her voice she did not feel. 

“It’s all right,” she repeated soothing herself as much as easing his transition back to wakefulness. “We’re safe. Don’t fight so hard.” 

Double images rolled through the Doctor’s vision as he fought the blackness that had swallowed him. His head was too heavy to lift and his body refused to respond as he tried to pull himself back to wakefulness. His stomach clenched and his hearts pounded, as combinations of time and space blurred in his mind, tossing him like a fishing boat in a hurricane and he groaned in pain. Donna’s hand cupped around the side of his face, her fingers behind his neck holding his head steady as with each roll of consciousness he grew stronger. With a sudden lurch he hauled himself upright, crying out with the exertion. His head spun and his eyes sought focus. His chest heaved with gulped breaths and Donna’s strong hands pulled him into an embrace. She hugged him as he gained control of his body and wrapped his arms around her, dropping his head onto her shoulder and inhaling her scent as a buoy to the present. 

“Urgh.” 

Donna's coat muffled the unintelligible sound, and she raised a hand to the back of his neck, smoothing his sweat drenched hair. Gradually he moved again, shifting backwards, gaining balance and motor control. When he pulled back from the embrace his eyes were wide, red, and staring and his skin sallow. 

“Tea,” he articulated again, his tongue thick and mouth dry, “Good for recuperation.” 

Donna placed her tin mug of brewed tea in his hand making sure his fingers wrapped around the cup before letting go. With the clumsy movement of a toddler he raised the drink to his lips and drank it all, gulping each mouthful before swilling the last of it around his teeth and swallowing hard.   

“Better?” 

He nodded, rolled his neck and broke out a cheerful grin. “Much more myself.” 

“Good,” Donna snapped, her voice loud and scared, “Because I was bloody worried about you, you stupid Martian! I mean, you dodge bullets, face giant wasps, survive arsenic poisoning without so much as flinching, but you collapse, twice, in a few hours, after a bit of time travel? Some Time Lord you are!” 

His face grew grave, “Donna, I’m so sorry…” 

Donna sniffed and wiped new water from her face, “And now you’ve made me cry!” 

“Come here,” the Doctor moved to collect his friend into a hug but his compassion was rejected.

“There’s been quite enough of that today as well,” she sniped, leaping up and moving away from the brazier, hiding her tears in the semi darkness of shadows. “Just leave me alone. All right?” 

Confused the Doctor raised his hands in surrender and watched as Donna stalked to the other end of the hold wiping her face with the tie from her shirt. His legs wobbled as he stood up and he shook out the pins and needles as he walked across the rotting boards, careful not to be silent in his approach. Donna refused to move from the opening as he grew near, and he stuck his hands in to the pockets of the beige jacket, uncertain of his next recourse. 

“Donna…” his voice was gentle, sincere, “I really am sorry.” 

When she didn’t respond he moved to her side, his shoulder brushing hers. 

“Ripping through time like this is unhealthy for anyone, but for a Time Lord it can be permanently damaging. My body has to adjust to the changes and with a jump like the last one it had to…” he searched for human a human term that Donna would understand, “... it had to reset… reboot… like a computer that’s crashing. I held on as long as I could…” 

Donna shushed him and rested her head on his shoulder. “It’s okay, Spaceman. I could see you fighting it, I was just scared I would lose you. I’m sorry for overreacting.” 

“You’d never do something like that…” he risked with a grin and saw her hiccup back a tear filled laugh. 

“You can hug me now, if you want,” she whispered, feeling his arms reaching around her before the words had left her lips. 

“It’s 1740,” he said, breaking the silence. “May. The coldest year in centuries, and for about four hundred years to come. We’re on the edge of the Thames, about two miles from where we started. Those tunnels must have been used for smugglers or traders before they were brick lined.” 

“Can I say, I never want to experience cold like this again. Not without a ski suit and thermal underwear.” 

He laughed, and tugged at her waistcoat, “You look very fetching in brown.” 

“You’ll look very fetching with a black eye in a minute.” 

Between them they had packed up the trunk with the remains of the tea, the mugs and other sundry items, wrapping their own cloths in oilskins and fashioning handles for them out of the rope. Everything smelt of damp and smoke, their own clothes were still wet, but they had agreed they might be glad of more modern clothes later. The Doctor helped Donna into the heavy jacket and looped the long rope over her shoulder making her clothes into a sack on her back. 

“Where are we heading?” she shifted the weight on her shoulders trying to make it more comfortable. 

“Back to the temple.” He doused the fire with some water and slide a candle into the middle of his pack before throwing it over his back. “We know we can access the hub from there. With every shift more of the local area gets sucked in and starts to spin, which creates more energy which that computer is using to create the time lock. I think that lab, maybe even the surrounding rooms, are protected. I think they are inside the central core.” 

“So if we get back there we’ll find Darijus and the others?” 

“I’m counting on it.” The Doctor smoothed his hair back and neatened his necktie.

“You look like a regular Casanova,” Donna knocked his hand away from preening. “Come on, let’s get on with it. I’m not looking forward to that tunnel again.” 

Outside the light was brighter and the afternoon sun was creeping through a thin line of mist that had clung on through the day. Marsh land oozed with filthy water as they stepped out of the hulk and blinked in the brighter light. A heron who had been busy feeding in a pool nearby startled at their sudden appearance and it took to the sky, large wings flapping slowly as it fly upstream to quieter waters. 

“We’re not going through the tunnels,” the Doctor said, pointing to a line of leafless trees in the distance, “It will be easier above ground so we should be out of the weather before dusk. It’s about 2 miles in that direction.” 

Ever the pessimist Donna scowled at the tree line, “I hope you have a plan for when we get there.” 

She did not look up to see the Doctor’s defensive expression.His blustering was quite enough to tell Donna everything she needed to know. 

Whilst the walk across the marsh was hard work, it was far better than their hike the night before. In daylight they could see the marshland birds feeding and watch a constant flotilla of small boats travelling up and down stream. Sinking knee deep several times Donna cursed like a sailor making the Doctor laugh as he hauled her out, only to find himself stuck instead. After the marsh came solid ground, still hard from the winter’s frost. Picking up a narrow track that travelled in the right direction they picked up speed, making good headway before the Doctor raised a hand of caution and they came to a standstill. 

“Is that… tarmac?” Donna asked, looking at the stretch of black potholed path in front of them. “In 1740? They didn’t have tarmac in 1740 did they?” 

He drew a deep breath, his face grim, “The edges of time are blurring. I wonder what else is being dragged through.” 

“How bad is this?” she said staring at the black track, “It’s only tarmac.” 

“But what was on that piece of road when it was ripped through?” the Doctor asked, “And where was it before? Should it be here in two hundred years time, or is it from another part of Chiswick, or London, or Cornwall?!” 

Eyebrows raised and hands held wide Donna signalled her understanding of the gravity of the situation. 

“Is it safe to walk on?” 

“Reasonably,” the response was tentative, “Residual energy from the shift may be uncomfortable, but it isn’t going to drop you into a black hole.” 

Donna stepped onto the tarmac, leather boot crunching in the gravel of the pothole. She felt a prickling in her skin and looked across at the Doctor, a muscle in his neck jerking as a similar, stronger, sensation washed over him. 

“Come on,” he said tersely and lengthened his stride. 

The temple, when they reached it, had a recent coat of paint and was less weathered than Donna remembered. Small trees had been planted in a garden nearby and somewhere in the distance she could hear the rough voices of the house’s garden staff who still had to work, no matter what the conditions. With trepidation the Doctor lead the way inside, heavy coat flapping against the white walls as he went. 

“Can you smell that?” he asked Donna, his voice low. 

She nodded, “It’s that burning smell again.” 

“Stay close.” 

Familiarity made crossing the room in the dim light an easy task. With an outstretched hand the Doctor looked for the invisible wall, cautious of crossing into a time zone had no escape route. When his fingers found the edge of the wall he snapped back as though it burnt and Donna looked at him, her expression full of concern. 

“It’s fine,” he reassured her, “I’m just a bit sensitive.” 

“What are you? A Time Boy or a Time Lord?” she nudged him with her shoulder. 

“Oh boy, every time,” he grinned, “Who what’s to be a grown-up, anyway?” 

“Come on then, let's see what’s in there this time.” Donna crossed the threshold and shivered, surprised to feel the prickles against her own skin and a knot tighten in her stomach. She turned back in time to see the Doctor’s grimace as crossed the barrier with palpable reluctance. 

Inside the entrance tunnel the lights were still on, twentieth century strip lights running along the centre of the ceiling. Many were missing or broken but there were enough to make walking easy. At the junction they strode straight ahead making their way to the computer lab. The corridor was clear now, broken glass from the lights removed and the unhinged door was gone. 

“Doctor!” Max’s voice surprised them as they walked into the room and both spun to see the scientist working at a small computer on the opposite side of the room. Sporting a heavily bandaged hand and a scar across the forehead Max had had far more recuperation time than the one night they had spent in the rotting boat. 

“Max,” the Doctor’s smile was broad, “Good to see you up and about. How long has it been?” 

“Six weeks,” Max looked them both up and down, admiring their outfits, “I assume you came the long way round?” 

“Not really,” Donna replied, dropping her bag to the floor and allowing the heavy coat to fall from her shoulders. “One night in 1740 is all it took.” 

“This time stuff is odd,” Max replied, “You must be Donna. Nice to meet you. Darijus hasn’t stopped talking about you. I think he planned to turn your coat into a shrine if you didn’t turn up soon.” 

Colour rose in Donna cheeks, “Well I want that back, and some normal clothes! These…” she gestured to the hose, “... were not made for ladies.” 

Ignoring the socialising the Doctor had crossed the room to first look at Ellie, then her computer. She sat, head resting on her hands, asleep at the desk. Beside her head was a flask and the remains of a ration pack rehydration meal. 

Max followed the Doctor’s stare, “We figured we were running faster than the time inside that bubble. It took a while to work out how much faster, but then I used the computer clock in the corner of her screen to work it out. It's been less than 8 hours for her.” 

The Doctor looked back at Ellie, “How did she get the food?” 

Max indicated to a bag sat on the floor under Ellie’s chair. “Emergency rations and survival pack, she had it with her.” 

“What have you been working on?” he nodded toward Max’s computer. 

A look of fear crossed Max’s face, eyes widening a fraction. “I managed to take a copy of the software that had backed up on the server and opened it in a sandbox… I know it was a risk… and I have been careful, I swear. Nothing else has happened, I’ve been trying to break down the code, but there are thousands of lines and it’s complex. I haven’t made much headway.” 

A beam of a smile grew across the Doctor’s face and he bounced across the room, grabbing Max in an impetuous hug. “Oh well done Max! Now I can see the whole programme. Let’s have a look.” 

“If you two are going to get technical, I will enter domestic bliss,” Donna announced, hefting the bags of wet clothes in her hands. “Anything like a washing machine in this place of yours?” 

Max nodded, “Head back up to the office - you’ll find Darijus there going through the engineering manuals. He'll help you, I'm sure.” 

“Don’t go outside,” the Doctor warned her, “And… well… I’d wait till you have some normal clothes on before you try flirting. You look a bit…” 

“If you say butch I swear…” 

“...a bit of a rogue…” he finished with a wink. 

Max watched the exchange bemused, “Are you two a couple?” 

“No.” The reply came in unison. 

“Exes?” 

The Doctor shook his head, “Mates, just mates.” 

“Best mates.” Donna added, “I don’t spend night’s freezing on a leaking boat for just anyone you know, sunshine.” 

The hub’s medical officer was very pleased to see Donna walk through the office door. In the six weeks they had spent locked inside the hub Darijus had reorganised the office into a makeshift centre of operations. Notes and drawings plastered the walls, mathematical workings covered an enormous whiteboard and a long desk, made from the broken door, was stacked of paperwork. Looking up at the movement in the hallway Darijus’ first look of confusion was replaced by a beam of joy and a deep chuckle from his throat. 

“Oh, dear lady, you are a site for sore eyes, and humour for a heavy heart!” 

Despite herself Donna laughed and, dropping the bag of clothes, turned in a circle so he could enjoy the full glory of her 18th century garb. 

“Do you like it?” she asked when her back was to him, turning her head to look over her shoulder and winking. “It’s a little number I picked up off the back of a boat in old Chiswick town in 1740. I thought I’d wear it to church on Sunday.” 

“Miss Noble, you would look attractive even if you were to wear a potato sack,” he was right behind her in one movement, taking her hand as an old fashioned gentleman and twisting her on-the-spot so that end of the movement rolled him into his arms, their faces perilously close. 

“That sort of charm will get a girl in trouble,” Donna whispered her face flushing. 

He winked a bushy eyebrow at her, “That would depend on whether the lady would like to get in trouble or not.” 

“Right now I’d like to get out of these clothes…” 

Darijus reached one hand to the tied neck of the shirt and held the knot between his thick fingers, a wicked smirk bursting from under his beard.

“...and into something normal,” Donna finished with a grin. 

“Your hand is like ice,” he said with concern as she ducked out from his arm and he caught her other hand in his, covering her cold fingers with his for warmth. 

“It’s like the Arctic out there,” she groused, “Although, in fairness that might be a bit of an exaggeration.” 

“Please, come, sit with me, and I shall make you good coffee, though you must forgive the lack of milk.” He grinned again. “We have no access to the supermarket at the moment.” 

The comfort in Darijus’ grip made Donna smile more than his attempt at humour, “You’re very kind but first I need to clean some normal clothes so I stop feeling like a drag king.” 

With a flourished bow Darijus grinned, “This way, milady.” 

“Why thank you, kind sir.” 

Darijus flipped the bags of laundry back to Donna with a quick movement of his wrist, “But you will still have to do your own washing.” 

“Well, it was worth a try,” she said with a smirk. “What have you found out in the last few weeks?” 

The smile on Darijus’ face crinkled away into a frown. “Very little. Max has been working through the computer software and I have been looking for a means of turning off the power. In the first three days we used all the energy reserves. They were designed to last for twelve months.” 

“And the power didn’t drop when the energy ran out?” 

They entered a small room at the end of the corridor and Donna busied herself with the clothing while Darijus watched from the doorway, leaning against the frame and tugging on his beard thoughtfully as he spoke. 

“No. So I searched the office for documentation on the generator and it seems there are natural resources used for continuing the supply of power to this base.” 

“Natural resources?” Donna repeated with a frown, “What, like a wind turbine?” 

“This is Torchwood,” he said with a touch of sarcasm, “A wind turbine or a solar panel would be too obvious. No, they devised a means of harvesting geothermal energy from the rocks beneath us.” 

“At the risk of sounding dumb… what?” 

Darijus smiled, “It is not dumb to admit a lack of knowledge. In this case a large unit has been buried in the earth. In the domestic life this would be used to heat a home, or a glass house, but alien technology adaptions were made to the generator to convert it into something useable. The energy source is not endless, but it will take many, many years to expire, even at the current rate.” 

“And even if it did run out, the wormhole is sucking in energy from every resource it can find. Sooner or later it will suck in the country and drain the national grid or turn the clocks forward to a time when there’s more energy available.” 

“Correct,” Darijus agreed, “So it is in our interests to turn off the power, before this can happen.” 

Remembering the piece of tarmac on the road Donna shivered, “It’s already starting.” 

“Do not worry, Donna,” Darijus said, leading her back to the operations room. “I know this can be resolved.” 

“Well that’s one out of the five of us.” Her dry tone made Darijus laugh again. 

Back in the office Darijus indicated Donna sit on the plush two seater sofa at the back of the room. It was darker in the corner and from the blanket over the sofa arm it was clear someone had been sleeping there, at least intermittently. 

“Are you leading me to your bed?” Donna’s voice raised a notch or two in volume. 

“No, no,” he assured her, “I have fallen asleep here with the papers a time or two. Max was kind enough to provide me with a blanket that is all. I have a bunk room if you would like to see it…” 

“Oi, watch it!” Donna warned, “I’m not that kind of girl.” 

He cleared away a stack of papers on the sofa, stacking them horizontally on another pile of papers on the table to mark the difference. Donna took her seat, curling into a protective ball, her energy levels dwindling to nothing as the sofa cushioned her cold, tired bones.

“Indeed you are not, and neither did I take you for such a woman,” he reassured her, his hand lingering on her shoulder before he moved back to the desk.  “You will drink coffee now?” 

Darijus indicated to a small 1980’s style coffee pot on a simmer stove. Even from a distance it looked thick and black. 

“It is the good kind, from my own rooms. Max drinks the instant, I consider it a lack of taste, but each to their own, as you say.” 

When he received no reply Darijus looked back at the sofa to see Donna's head lolling against the soft cushions, a soft snore creeping from her nose. Placing the blanket over her and carefully tucking up the edges to prevent draughts Darijus smiled to himself and went back to his work.


	7. Chapter 7

Back in the computer lab the Doctor looked up from his study to see Darijus walk through the door with mugs of coffee and something that smelt like fresh bread. Max greeted him with a welcome hug and, picking up a chunk of buttered bread, went back to work. 

“What have you done with Donna?” the Doctor asked, taking the food and drink he with a nod of appreciation. 

“She has fallen asleep in the office. I thought it best to leave her to rest.”

“Quite right too,” the Time Lord agreed, glad that Donna had the opportunity to recover from the night’s ordeals. “You make excellent fruit bread, Darijus.”

“Baking helps me to think,” he said, accepting the compliment with a slight inclination of his head. “What do you think of Max’s sandpit?”

“Superb work,” the Doctor took another bite of the bread, savouring the taste of the dried fruit and the sugar that came from it. It was a far better meal than the dried meat and biscuits the night before. “Toshiko was working on this as a safety protocol, something that was being designed to protect her base in the event of a major danger or security breach. It is supposed to be a kind of time lock, creating a barrier in time that nothing can penetrate, keeping those inside safe.”

Max and Darijus joined the Doctor at the computer terminal. 

“You worked that out in thirty minutes?” Max asked, awed.

“Well... I worked that out in five and half minutes, and the half was extra because the mouse is left handed. Then I spent another three minutes wondering where it went wrong, and I think I dozed off myself for a while, that or I was hypnotised by the fish in that tank over there.”

Max and Darijus looked at the blank wall and frowned.

“Doctor, there’s no fish tank.” Max said. 

“Oh,” the Doctor looked in the same direction, “Dreaming then. Anyway, there are several strange things in all of this. One, how did Toshiko know how to develop this software? Where did she get the codes for the time lock, because they are specific codes, too specific?”

“What do you mean, too specific?” Max interrupted before the Doctor could continue.

The Doctor pointed at a set of numbers on the screen. “These numbers, they repeat in the script, ten times in total. They form part of the core, they’re like an access code, something you would find in a hand crafted time travel device.”

“Ms Sato works at the Cardiff hub,” Darijus offered, “Perhaps Captain…”

“... Jack!” 

All three spoke his name together, and the Doctor nodded, “That would make sense. You see, those digits make up part of an internal harmonic in the TARDIS. Jack’s the only person who’d know enough about these things to remember, and use, the code. It also explains why Donna and I can walk through the barriers, it’s designed so that a TARDIS traveller can enter, a fail safe which would mean Jack could get in, or out.” He paused and brushed crumbs from his chin, “That’s brilliant. And dangerous. I’ve had some very dubious characters in my TARDIS over the years. But I suppose he wasn’t to know.”

“That is one problem solved,” Max agreed, “But you said there were others?”

Leaping up from his seat the Doctor paced between Ellie and Max's computer. “This programme is not designed to be sentient, but it is, at least to a degree. It has become so advanced that it can think for itself to the point of guaranteeing its own safety. It knew we were trying to unplug it - which is why Max here performed aerial acrobatics without a trapeze.”

“This is a major concern,” Darijus interjected, “Can it interpret speech? Because if this is the case it will know everything about our plans to turn off the generator.”

The Doctor shook his head, “No, it’s not that advanced. It’s more a case of probability and likely actions, and a localised sensor that picks up movements in electrical fields. What’s the one thing you do if a computer is malfunctioning?”

“Turn it off.” Max replied with a heavy voice. “Which is why it locked Ellie in when I reached for the power button. Damn it, I should have been more careful.”

Max felt the Doctor’s hand land on a shoulder and looked up into his eyes.

“I doubt it had anything to do with that at all. Ellie was just too close when the programme instigated its initial security wall after the malfunction.” 

Max felt all the years of training slip away in the face of the Doctor’s brilliance, “Malfunction?”

“Ellie didn’t turn it on,” the Doctor said, his voice gentle, “It was a malfunction that started a chain of events that couldn’t be stopped. There was a piece of code that was pasted, probably by accident, at the start of the script. Instead of opening a menu it booted straight into action. Perceiving a threat, because it wasn’t in its original environment the incomplete programme ran and, because it is intelligent software, it kept trying to come up with solutions to its own problems, causing more damage every time it tried.”

Max stared at the floor in silence while Darijus sighed. 

“Is this something you can fix, Doctor?” Darijus asked. 

“Actually I think this will need a some help from Max,” the Doctor said looking at the scientist and seeing a flush of fear run through Max’s eyes. “I need to extend the wall around Ellie so I can get in there and shut down the programme, but we need to do it without allowing the sandbox version of the software to start duplicate the issues we already have.”

Max swallowed hard, “I have no idea how to do that.”

The Doctor swung round and Max flinched. “Max, you are brilliant. I’ve seen what you’ve done so far and it is outstanding work, and you were heading in the right direction. Move your focus to this portion of the script…” 

Max followed the Doctor’s finger to the screen.

“You will create an illusion for the software to make it think it needs to extend that protective shell by a metre, just enough space to let me in. You can do this, Max.”

With a short nod Max slid into the seat vacated by the Doctor and, pulling earbuds from a trouser pocket, read through the highlighted code again. “Give me two hours.”

The Doctor grinned, “That’s the spirit, but make it one. Remember, within that wall the software has only been running for a few hours and it’s still created this mess.”

“And what do you need from me, Doctor?” Darijus asked.

“You said you’d been working on a way to cut the power?”

Darijus nodded, “I was explaining to Donna before.”

“Ah, well, never mind,” the Doctor said with a wince, “Donna isn’t the most… technical… but she is brilliant in a lot of other ways.”

Darijus’ eyes seemed to glow whenever Donna’s name arose. “She seems very astute to me.”

Resisting the urge to roll his eyes that Doctor took Darijus by the elbow and led him out of the room leaving Max the silence required to work. 

 

 

“This way,” Darijus steered the Doctor to one of the sealed tunnels and pointed to a thick conduit which ran from the top of the closure back towards the office area. Wrapped in yellow and black tape it bore the label ‘telecoms’ in white letters. “I have checked every detail of the plans, this is not the communications access route. That is a direct line, straight down, from the edge of the telecoms box above us.”

“And you’re sure this is a line in for the geothermal energy?” the Doctor reached for his pocket, groping for his sonic only to realise the coat was not his and his sonic was lost.

Darijus reached into his own pocket and withdrew the sonic screwdriver, holding to the Doctor on an open palm. “I found this after the explosion. Part of the tunnel collapsed and there is a new wall containing us. But this was on our side. It is, I think, working.”

The Doctor swiped the sonic from Darijus’ hand and kissed him on the forehead, “Oh, you’re brilliant as well!”

“I am not yet sure if you are brilliant or are a mad-man,” Darijus responded, wiping his forehead.

“Oh… a little of both,” said the Doctor. He held the sonic to his ear and twisted it several times, checking the calibration. 

“Is it functioning?”

“Not perfect but useable,” he declared, standing close to the wall and pointing the sonic up to the conduit. Various mumbles came from the Doctor’s direction, none of them intelligible as he scanned the piping, the walls and then ran, heavy leather boots slapping the ground loudly as he charged down the corridors following the yellow and black conduit from room to room until he skidded to a stop at the doorway to the generator. 

“Nice work, Darijus,” he said, slapping the other man on the back, “You are dead right. And that’s a bit of a problem because I don’t think we can turn this off from inside.”

Darijus nodded, “That was my concern also, but I had hoped that you might be able to go outside and shut it off from there.”

The look on the Doctor’s face told Darijus that it would not be that simple.

“Sorry Darijus, old chum, but wherever that geothermal energy production unit is it isn’t in 1740, which is when we are in the time outside.”

“That would make matters more difficult,” Darijus replied, his voice grave. “And so, if we are to disconnect the power we must be in a time close to our own.”

“Well, this was the backup plan,” the Doctor said with a slight smile, “But pulling the plug would have been easier than what I’m about to attempt with Max’s’ help.”

The hum of the generator and the whine of the sonic were there only sounds as the Doctor and Darijus looked at the innocuous machine, both lost in thought. Darijus sighed and lent against the wall, rubbing his eyes. Six weeks of almost constant working had taken a toll, his skin was grey and dark bags had formed under his eyes. 

Giving Darijus space the Doctor moved towards the generator, examining its construction. As he approached, he felt the familiar needles of an invisible wall. Pushing against it his hand broke through and grasped the power lever, but the lever was locked in position and he was forced to conclude that Darijus was correct in his assessment. Disconnecting the power from within the hub would not be possible. Rolling his neck as he stepped back the Doctor allowed some tension in his shoulders to dissipate. 

“I had thought to use dynamite,” Darijus’ joked, “But we do not have any and the explosion would only give the software more energy.”

“And it would probably bring the roof down on you all.”

“Ah if only we could turn time backwards,” Darijus sighed.

The Doctor shook his head, “It’s not that simple.”

“No, I realised this,” Darijus agreed, “Come, you look like a man who would benefit from sitting.”

Slouched against the wall the Doctor was not in a position to deny Darijus’ assessment. Every cell of his body ached and the effort to keep track of time drained every resource he had. 

“Do you require medical attention?” the medic asked, looking the Doctor up and down.

Shaking his head the Doctor stood up straight and plastered on a convincing smile. “No, no. I don’t want Torchwood doing any scanning of my anatomy thank you very much. You seem to know more than enough about me as it is.”

“You have my word, Doctor, I will not retain any records.”

The Doctor placed a hand on each of Darijus’ shoulders. “And I accept your word in good faith. But there is nothing you can do that will help with this. We are all counting on finding a way to stop this wormhole.”

Darijus lifted his hands and placed them on the Doctor’s arms, “I think, Doctor, had I not been Torchwood, you and I should have been friends. Now, come. I have a space you can rest...”

The radio at Darijus’ side chirped and Max’ voice rang through. “Need you in the lab, it’s urgent.”

A worn smile crossed the Doctor’s lips, “No rest the wicked Darijus, you know that.”

“So it would seem.”

 

 

Disturbed by another radio in the operations room Donna wiped sleep from her eyes and blinked, surprised by the location and the blanket that had been tucked over her with much care. Her clothes were itching, and the necktie felt as though it had tightened when she slept but as she tried to remove it she heard the Doctor’s voice in the corridor and the fast footfall of two people walking in a hurry. Jumping up she ran to the door stepping out into the corridor just as the Doctor and Darijus passed. 

“What’s going on?” she asked, trying to wipe a small amount of drool from the corner of her mouth without Darijus noticing.

“Not sure,” the Doctor asked, “Max has called us back to the lab.”

“Progress?”

He shrugged, “I hope so.”

The Doctor strode on and Darijus waited allowing Donna to exit the room. 

“How long have I been asleep?” she asked, self conscious she had fallen asleep in his company.

“Only about an hour,” he told her, “It was enough?”

“I need a week in bed, not an hour!” Donna laughed as she caught his mischievous wink. “I expect wine and date before that!”

“Then I may take you for a meal?” Darijus whispered over her shoulder, “When we are safe, of course.”

For once Donna was glad the passageway was not wide enough to walk two abreast as she felt her face turn bright red and all words abandoned her.

“I would like that very much,” she replied when she found her voice. 

 

 

The computer lab was a hive of activity when they entered, and although they were only a few seconds behind the Doctor, it was apparent that something was not going to plan. Max and the Doctor were working on the same keyboard, fighting each other for key space yet somehow working in perfect unison.

“What is it?” both Donna and Darijus asked, exchanging a flirtatious look with each other.

Max slid under the Doctor’s right arm and launched for a fire extinguisher on the other side of the room.

“The software is too clever,” the Doctor snapped, “Even in the sandbox it has realised we are trying to change something we shouldn’t have access to and, as a basic self preservation procedure it is trying to fry the motherboard rather than accept adjustments.”

Max armed the extinguisher and pointed it at the tower, “It’s fascinating. Toshiko’s work is so far beyond anything I have worked on before, she thinks differently to most programmers.”

“Hold on!” the Doctor bellowed, “Don’t do anything yet!”

“Waiting on your command,” Max replied, sweeping bedraggled hair back with one hand, holding the fire extinguisher in the other. 

“Donna!” the Doctor’s voice was loud and excited.

She looked at the Doctor’s excited face, his eyes full of anticipation.

“Stand here and keep pressing this button, every second, until I say stop, or until this screen…” he pointed to a second screen with a pressure dial on it, “... reaches ninety eight percent. If that happens yell at Max.”

Donna squeezed passed the Doctor and felt his hand brush across her shoulder as she took over on the keyboard.

“Darijus, where’s the medical kit?”

The medic pointed to a big green box with a white cross hun on the wall.

“We might need that in a minute,” the Doctor said, “But until then stand by the main breaker in the corner. I’m going to try to break through the wall and turn the software off. If I manage that pull the plug before it starts again.”

“But time is running more slowly in there,” Donna looked towards the other computer and Ellie who was standing now, her hands not on the computer but spread across the edge of the wall which had moved back a little from the workstation.

“That’s why you have to keep watch. For you this may take a very long time. If this goes wrong anything could happen. You have to watch closely, keep hitting that button Donna.”

Donna swallowed hard and nodded. “Okay.”

“Max, get another keyboard attached and try to keep the link between the two systems live.”

“You linked the two computers?” Darijus was aghast. “That’s madness!”

“Only way to do this in a hurry,” came the Doctor’s reply, “Once the sandbox version began to collapse we had to think on our feet.”

“Oh my god,” Donna whispered as she realised how serious the situation had become in just a few minutes.

“Donna, Darijus, listen to Max. Max is in charge of this operation. Whatever Max says, you do. Do you understand?”

Both Darijus and Donna affirmed their understanding. 

“Be careful, Spaceman,” Donna gave him a broad smile, “We’ll be watching.”

He held her gaze as she spoke and she knew from his expression he was not sure of success.

“Allons-y!” he called with a grin and turned to Ellie, moving himself to a point against the wall where he could pass through and stand.

 

 

Invisible pressure pushed against him as he stepped into the wall. Unlike the other barriers this wall was stronger, the final protection for the software and the people it was designed to protect. The connection to Max’s computer had created a new alert and in the slower time zone the software was reconfiguring, trying to block any entrance. It was the time differential that the Doctor was counting on. If he was fast enough, he could jam the USB device held tight in his fist into the computer and initiate an immediate shutdown. 

The wall resisted his advances, closing around him, crushing his chest until he could not breath. Respiratory bypass kicked in and he pushed on, pain from contact with the wall made his eyes burn with unshed tears and he curled his other hand into a fist, fingernails biting into the flesh of his palm.

“It’s taking forever,” Donna watched the agony of the Doctor’s face in slow motion as he tried to breach the wall. 

Darijus unhooked the first aid kit from the wall and opened it ready then returned to his station. “He will make it.”

“He better hurry,” Max was grim, “I’m having trouble keeping on top of all this. It was easier with two people.”

“What happens if he can’t get through?”

Max shrugged and Darijus shook his head, “I suppose we have to come up with another plan.”

Glancing sideways Max caught a glimpse of the Doctor’s bared teeth and a grimace of pain. “I told him this was a bad idea.” 

Tearing her own eyes from the Doctor’s slow progress she threw a brave smile at Max, “He doesn’t generally listen to anyone when they say it’s a bad idea. He’s got a bit of a superiority complex. Time Lord’s know best I suppose.”

Darijus shook his head, “I think, perhaps, he should have listened.”

The wall was visible to them now, a moving force that looked like liquid which bowed and swayed with the Doctor’s touch. The wall was thicker than the one Darijus had tried to breach and it swamped the Doctor until he looked like a man drowning in a vertical ocean.

“I can’t bear it!” Donna cried, turning her head back to stare at the screen with the pressure gauge. The pressure had risen a few degrees.

Max caught Donna’s concerned look, “Donna, what’s the pressure reading?”

“Eighty five percent,” she replied, “And it’s creeping up.”

“Focus on that,” Max instructed. A line of sweat on Max’s forehead began to run, MAx wiped it away with a swift brush of a sleeve. “Darijus, I think you’ve got time before he breaks through to the other side. Move the table and clear a space in case the exit isn’t smooth.”

“Eighty seven percent,” Donna called, “And speeding up.”

 

 

The membrane on the other side of the wall split as the Doctor broke through sending a ripple of energy all around the cage, illuminating the whole wall in a yellow light. Catching himself on the table the Doctor hauled in a lungful of air as he thrust the USB stick into the nearest port.

“Who the hell are you?” Ellie yelled, grabbing him by the waistcoat and pushing him up against the table. 

“I’m the man who’s trying to get you out of here,” he pulled her hands from his clothes and swung back to the computer. “I’m the Doctor. Now hold tight, we’re in for a bumpy ride.”

“What are you going?” she stood close to him, leaning over his shoulder, “I’ve been trying to initiate shutdown but it’s not working and I’ve been at it for hours.”

“As far as your friends are concerned you’ve been at it for six weeks,” the Doctor replied trying to focus on the task. “Oh, Ellie you’re too good! I didn’t think you’d had time to get this far. You’ve enabled the safety protocols, it’s scanning the USB and seen it as a threat!”

“I thought the safety protocols might help shut it down,” Ellie replied, “I’d tried everything else I could think of. What do you mean six weeks?”

“No time to explain,” the Doctor pounded the keys, running through the script, eyes flipping left and right as he sped through. “If I can just get this system to recognise my override credentials…”

Red lights started flashing at the top of the screen.

“... or maybe not…” He grabbed her hand and pulled her to the wall, their noses almost touching it. “Any second now there’s going to be a blip in the time lock. It is our one and only chance of getting out of here.”

“Then what?”

“Jump!” he yelled, leaping into motion and dragging Ellie with him.

 

 

“Ninety eight!” Donna cried. “Max it’s ninety eight!”

Max swore and tossed the keyboard aside, “Okay, then. Darijus stand ready.”

“I have been ready for the last three hours,” Darijus moaned, “I have stood here so long my feet are glued to the spot.”

“Jesus, Darijus, shut up!” Max’s face was red. “Donna, on my mark, get the hell out of there and I’ll take over. Be ready to help the Doctor and Ellie when then come through. Mark!”

Donna jumped from the chair and dived clear while Max took her position. Turning to the wall she could see the Doctor in mid leap, arms outstretched, dragging Ellie with him. Behind them there was something exploded in terrible slow motion. A blue spark reached up from the computer stretching up toward the Ellie and the Doctor. It grew bigger, curling at the edges and spinning, moving far faster than the people it pursued.

“Now Darijus!” Max yelled and Darijus pulled the plug realising that it was already too late to stop the explosion. 

Darijus cursed in his native tongue and English. “This will not be pretty.”

In a rush of noise the two time zone collided, the explosion shattering the wall as the Doctor and Ellie passed through it. A double boom rattled everything in the room, shaking mugs and papers to the floor and Max hung onto the computer, trying to type at the same moment. Darijus charged across the room and pinned the computer and monitors to the desk, grabbing an unused cable and trying to tie down the monitor with one hand while Max continued to work. The outer skin of the wall fractured and through it came the Doctor, Ellie’s hand still in his as the blast through them into the room like cannon balls. 

Ellie’s scream was the first human sound to punctuate the room. It was raw, pain filled and terrified. They fell in unison from the blast, the Doctor rolled to break his fall, Ellie - with no experience in the matter - crunched into the ground in a single, hard, impact. Landing on her back, her head smashing into the concrete with a sickening thud, her synthetic clothes alight.

Grabbing the fire extinguisher Donna rushed forward and pulled the trigger, smothering Ellie with white powder, dousing the worst of the flames. 

There was a mighty roar and the lights in the room flickered. Turning Donna saw the Doctor curled up in pain and she knew they were time shifting again. Throwing herself across the floor she reached for him, afraid that if they were to shift into different time zones, he would be alone and unprotected.

“Hold it!” Max yelled above the din, “Hold on! It didn’t work but the Doctor’s flipped control to this unit. I can keep it steady if I can just…”

There was a shudder as the earth moved all around them and the lights went out, but the computer in Darijus’ arms remained on, with Max in the pilot seat. 

“Got it!” Max exclaimed. 

And at that moment everything stopped.

 

 

“Get the first aid kit,” Donna forced the words out of her lips as she looked back at Ellie who was a mass of burnt skin and white powder.

With the world still again Darijus left the computer on the desk and picked up the medical kit, but pressing his fingers into the side of Ellie’s throat he closed eyes in sadness and let the kit slide to the floor.

“No…” Max whispered, still working on the computer, “She can’t be dead…”

“I’m sorry,” Darijus shook his head, a darkness settling in his eyes.

Beside Donna the Doctor rolled onto his side with an anguished cry.

“It’s okay,” Donna tried to comfort him with her voice breaking, “You’re okay.”

Darijus closed Ellie’s eyes and moved to Donna’s side trying to examine the Doctor. His clothes were burnt beyond wear and the exposed skin blistered along his left arm where he had been joined to Ellie. His lips were showing signs of cyanosis, turning blue at the edges.

“Oh my god,” Max whispered again in shock. 

Darijus did not look up from his patient, “Max, focus or we are all going to die.”

Tears dripped over Max’s cheek but Max did not look up from the screen. “I’m in control.”

“Good Max, very good.” Darijus reassured as he cut away the clothes to assess the Doctor’s burns.

“Doctor?” Donna caressed his cheek, “Doctor can you hear me?”

The Doctor sat bolt upright, grabbing Donna, his fingers pressing hard into her skin as he gasped for air. In a second he was on his feet, staggering, drunk on the lack of oxygen, to Max and the computer.

“Bring in online!” he urged, raw throat making his voice husky, and he clung to the desktop to stop himself from collapse. “Do it Max! Now!”

“I’m trying,” Max yelled back, “It’s not working!”

Donna and Darijus swooped under the Doctor’s shoulders taking his weight as he wobbled on unsteady legs. Clumsily he tried to push them off but his coordination was too poor. 

“Let me do it,” the Doctor insisted. He blinked, trying to clear his vision as another low rumble made the earth shudder. “We can’t shift again, I can’t...argh!”

With the strength of many men the Doctor pulled out of the supportive grip, doubling over as another time shift began to build. Donna felt prickles of discomfort run up her spine and saw Darijus and Max wince in a similar pain. 

“Max!” Donna yelled, “Whatever it is just bloody do it! This is killing him!”

“Don’t you think I’m trying?” Max screamed back. 

On his knees, the Doctor reached for the keyboard and snatched it from Max’s fingers. With unfocused pupils, he punched the keys faster than any human could type and the low rumble subsided, the vibrations tailing off into nothing. Dropping the keyboard onto Max’s lap the Doctor fell backwards into the waiting arms of Donna and Darijus, unconscious.


	8. Chapter 8

"It’s been hours," Max's bitter complaint broke a tense silence that held the room captive.  Max glanced up from the computer screen to see Darijus sweeping white fire extinguisher powder from the floor, his face dark and grim. 

With Max occupied maintaining the wormhole's stability the tasks of moving Ellie's corpse and the unconscious Time Lord had fallen on Darijus and Donna. They had moved both bodies with a makeshift gurney, carrying the Doctor to Darijus' bunk and Ellie to the cold storage unit in the morgue. Since his return, alone, from the bunk room Darijus had said nothing and Max had no desire to speak. 

In the six weeks that Ellie had was locked in the bubble Max had spoken to her every day, sometimes imagining her response. Her absence carved a hole in the centre of Max's chest. and as Darijus cleared the room, Max allowed quiet tears to fall. 

Clearing the room of every broken item Darijus contained his emotions on a taught, frayed rope, until he dropped a broken desk on the floor. The sound rang around the room like a car crash in a tunnel startling them both. Grief and rage broke Darijus' precarious emotional control. His huge hands gripped the desk and hurled it across the lab, smashing it into the side of the safe room. 

Unable to leave the computer Max looked on, helpless, as Darijus shattered the back of a broken chair the same way before. His energy spent he slumped to the floor leaning against the wall.  His head fell into his hands and his elbows rested on his knees, his body shaking.

In the bunk room Donna heard the sounds of destruction and she ran through the corridors dressed in her own clothes but wearing a dead woman’s shoes. Donna's face was a mirror for Max's, puffy cheeks and her eyes red. 

"It’s all right," Max’s voice was lifeless. "He just needs a minute." 

Donna followed Max’s gaze and crossed to Darijus, sliding down the wall herself and taking his hand gently with her own. With tenderness he squeezed her fingers and raised their hands to his lips, kissing her knuckles. 

"I can’t imagine what you’re going through," Donna said, her voice low and filled with compassion. "Trapped here for weeks, knowing you’re not in your own time, no contact with the outside world… losing the colonel, Arjun, and now Ellie…." 

"It is a slow death," Darijus told her, an unsettling darkness made his words heavy. "We wait for our time to come." 

"We will get you out of here," Donna squeezed his fingers tight and looked over to Max with a fierce expression. "The Doctor will work this out. I believe in him, and you can too." 

"How much do you know about him?" Max asked, "The Doctor, I mean." 

Donna frowned, "What are you getting at?" 

"Torchwood keeps many files of your friend," Max told her, hurt turning the words into malice. "He does great things. Great and terrible things." 

She nodded, thinking of the Racnos queen and her drowning children. "I know, but he does it to protect others." 

"Are you so sure?" 

Donna looked at Max, feeling her face flushing with anger and fear. Darijus squeezed her hand and drew her attention back to him. 

"You must excuse us, Donna. Exhaustion and pain will make even the kindest heart speak with cruelty." 

"Just remember," she said with forgiveness in her voice, "That’s the man who’s going to save us. I will expect full apologies from you both when that happens." 

Max turned back to the computer and Darijus sighed, hauling himself upright and offering Donna a hand to her feet. Neither of them responded to Donna’s order.

"Max, why don’t you see if you can monitor that from the meeting room? I will make food. If we are to be rescued we can, at least, provide our saviours with a little hospitality." 

"That should be possible," Max replied, suddenly glad at the change in the topic, "Would one of you turn on the main television screen in there for me?" 

"I will do so," Darijus agreed, "Donna will you help me?"

With a shake of her head Donna declined and turned left, following the passageways to the bunk room, salt stinging her eyes as she walked.

In Darijus’ bed the Doctor stirred, climbing back to consciousness like wading through the marshes on a moonless night. The portion of his being that was so dependant on Time filled with a desperate ache. The need for connection was so great it burnt in his soul, making his core hollow. Afraid of waking the greater part of him yearned to remain in the dark where the pain was less. Fighting passed it he pushed through the barriers of his mind, waking not with a scream but with tears pooling in his hands. 

To breathe was an effort, the pressure in his chest made it hard to move and he rasped two short lungs half full of air. His heavy eyes blinked open, focusing on first the ceiling above him and then the silhouette of Donna on the floor beside him. 

The available chair ignored, or perhaps preferring to make herself small, Donna Noble held his hand in a death grip. Both of her hands clasped his as she sobbed, her shoulders shaking but only the slightest sound escaping her lips. It was then that the Doctor, still battling unconsciousness realised the tears in his palm were not his at all. 

With a slow, pain filled, move the Doctor reached his free hand over his chest, aware then of the strapping and dressings that covered his arm and shoulder. His fingers brushed Donna's hair, his touch clumsy but gentle.

"Donna?" 

His low whisper reached her ears and she turned, catching his hand and almost pressing it to her lips before realising what she was doing. 

"Do this to me again, Spaceman, and I swear I’ll kill you myself," she sobbed, burying her face in the blanket at his chest. 

He clasped a hand behind her neck and awkwardly kissed her to top of her head. 

"If this happens again, I’ll take you up on the offer," he tried to joke and Donna pulled back, swatting him with reasonable force on his good shoulder.  "Help me?" 

His companion raised her head from the blanket and dried her eyes on her sleeve, "Up?" 

He nodded and Donna slid an arm under his back, easing him into a seated position. With a groan he swung his legs over the side of the bunk sides, his head reeling. He observed the dressings, noting the professional and secure fasting. It was clear that Darijus had tended his wounds. The sleeve of his shirt had been cut off with a knife but the remaining fabric was predominantly scorch marks and holes. It made him feel uncomfortable and half dressed.

"Do you know what happened?" Donna asked taking a seat at his side.

"I know the plan didn’t go as I intended." He rubbed his face and shook his head trying to clear of fog. "Blimey, Ellie’s a bit of a computer wizard herself. She’d done a lot more in the time she had in that bubble than I had accounted for. Trouble was that interfered with my plan, so I improvised and bumped control of the software to Max, at least that’s what I tried to do." 

"That bit worked," Donna told him, "You completed the link as you were passing out. Max hasn’t left that computer in nearly five hours. I think we are all afraid of the consequences if there’s another shift." 

The Doctor flexed his shoulder uncomfortably, "And Ellie? She was a little behind me, are her burns worse than this? I want to talk to her about what she discovered in her analysis." 

Donna took a deep breath and found herself trying not to cry again. The memory of Ellie's dead face, frozen in terror and the sensation of touching her body threatened to overwhelm her. 

"I’m sorry, Doctor. Ellie... she died." 

The enthusiasm that had been building inside him was snuffed out. Donna felt the change in his demeanour but did not have the energy to do more than wrap an arm around him. Mimicking her movement he drew her close to his side, and she took a little comfort from his embrace. He closed his eyes again and hung his head, the muscles in his neck cracking as he moved. 

"This is such a mess," Donna whispered, her voice broken.

"It’s not over yet," he responded her despair by pulling his shoulders back and hauling himself up onto his sockless feet. "Though, I have to admit I’d feel a bit more invincible if I wasn’t half dressed and barefoot." 

"Well then, you’re lucky that your suit doesn’t need ironing." Donna raised her head and produced a passable smile. "Seriously, what is it made of? You could make a fortune marketing that. It might help pay for the chips you’re always scrounging off me."

Four grim faces sat around the oval oak table in the hub’s meeting room. On the wall at the far end a large television screen with a swirling graphic dominated the meal. With Max reluctant to turn away from it and the Doctor’s entire concentration on the fast scrolling data there was no conversation. Even Donna was mesmerised by the patterns created by the wormhole. Darijus was the only person whose attention was not focused on the screen. He had eyes only for Donna and her face flushed until her skin was deep crimson.   

In the centre of the table bowls of rice and a meat based stew steamed, an over provision for people with no appetite. Half eaten plates of food sat in front of everyone.

"It seems to be holding steady," Max remarked, poking the rice around the plate with no enthusiasm for eating it. "As long as someone keeps counteracting the commands that is." 

"It held for three weeks last time," Darijus pointed out, "It was only when the Doctor tried to save Ellie that we set it off again." 

"And a great job he did at that," Max snapped. "That was a resounding success, wouldn’t you say, Doctor?" 

"Now hang on a minute…" Donna began in the Doctor's defence but he silenced her with a shake of his head. 

"I’m sorry Ellie died," his voice was regretful, his eyes dark. 

"You’re sorry you killed her? Is that what you mean?" Max stabbed a fork into the meal so hard that the plate skidded across the table and onto the floor. The sound of china on brick resonated around the room. 

The Doctor didn’t move. 

"I am sorry Ellie died," he repeated, "And if you want to blame me for her death right now then please, go ahead. If it helps you get through this, then that’s fine with me. One more death on my conscience isn’t going to make the nightmares any worse. If we survive I suggest you think long and hard about what happened here. Then you can decide where the blame truly lies." 

"You think you’re so damn clever…" Max spat across the table.

"Compared with you? Compared with humans? Yes, I am. Because I have nine hundred years of experience compared to your few decades." The Doctor’s voice remained calm but beneath the table Donna saw him ball his fists and release his fingers, loosening away the tension. "If you don’t want my help, then that’s fine, go sit in a corner and let me sort out the mess you and your team made. There’s more at stake here than one measly Torchwood hub and its occupants. It’s about time you took a look outside and realised that." 

Max flung the keyboard across the table hitting the Doctor in the chest. "In case you haven’t noticed we can’t go outside." 

"Look at the screen, Max," the Doctor suggested. "The map at the top shows where the walls were. These insert shows their current positions. This time tunnel has grown, increasing the distance between the walls. Time is stretching, and matter is going along with it. Go outside and take in some air. Tell me what you can see. No, in fact let’s all go. It’s about time we got a proper picture!" 

Donna lept up and followed the Doctor as he strode out of the room. She didn’t turn around but heard Darijus’ chair squeal on the floor and the curt snap of his voice as he told Max to get up. 

From the Doctor’s pace there was no sign of any lack of energy. Almost running along the passageways his long strides took him away from Donna and though she called to him to slow down he did not. It was a signal, she was sure, that Max had poked a sore point in the Doctor's armour. As she slowed down, too tired to run, Darijus and Max caught up with her and Donna’s control over her anger broke. 

"I can see why he dislikes Torchwood so much," Donna spun round and sniped at Max.

Max shoved passed her and strode on ahead, ignoring every word. Donna’s follow up comments silenced by Darijus who slipped his hand into hers and held her back.

"It is often best to let Max be," he said with a soft voice. 

A snort of derision shot from Donna’s nose, and she tried to pull her hand away, only to feel Darijus hold it a little more tightly. 

"Let go of my hand." Donna enunciated every syllable with crystal clarity. 

Darijus let go instantly and dropped back a pace giving Donna space. She walked on for a few steps then stopped, took a deep breath and turned back, swallowing her pride and her anger in one hard lump. 

"I’m sorry, Darijus, that was uncalled for. I don’t know what I was thinking." 

"You are tired, like the rest of us," Darijus reassured her, "You have nothing to apologise for." 

Donna led on again, her hand behind her, held in Darijus’ rough grip making it an awkward way to walk but she did not care. In the vestibule outside the main door they hesitated, Darijus holding back and making Donna turn. Light flooded the room and Donna could see the look of lost hope in Darijus, it's rawness crushing her chest. She raised a hand to his face and stared into his eyes, all her rage poured into faith and desperation.

"No!" she told him, her voice quavering with intensity, "You can stop that right now. We are all getting out of here!" 

Darijus’ fingers brushed against the soft skin of her face and she closed her eyes, leaning into his touch. 

"You, dear Donna, will be free from here. The Doctor will not abandon you, this is very clear. For a man with so much sorrow as he, he will not leave his closest friend, no matter what it may cost. But I fear that Max and I, we may not be so lucky." 

"He won’t leave you behind," Donna promised, "I won’t let him." 

Darijus smiled at her, "And I believe he listens to you when he is able. But in case I am right, and in case we do not have our date…" 

He leant forwards, holding her face in one hand, pulling her gently towards him with the other until their lips touched. Tentative at first, unsure of her response, his lips brushed hers. Donna met his kiss with equal caution before reaching her hands upwards and grasping his jacket, pulling him closer. 

A cough from someone else drew them back to the present. Donna felt her face turn bright red and Darijus attempted to hide the grin that had spread across his features. 

"Right, sorry," the Doctor sounded embarrassed, "If you two are... urhm… ready...  you really need to get up here." 

Donna laughed and Darijus took her hand again. 

"Of course, Doctor," he said, "We were just coming." 

The Doctor spun around and stalked off leaving Donna and Darijus’ to burst into a fit of laughter. 

"I don’t think he expected that," Donna said, crossing the vestibule and heading towards the main door. "Mind you, I’m not sure I expected that either." 

"Life is too short. We must take risks where we can." 

"We’re still getting all of us home," Donna insisted, "But if you want to do that again, later, just in case you won’t hear any objections from…." 

Donna’s words died in her mouth as they stepped outside the temple into the red light of a dying sun. 

Where once there had been fields and a stately home, now there stood skyscrapers, their towers stretching up into the blood red sky. Each one of them cracked, the window panes broken and the homes deserted. The skeleton of a dead tree, trunk half petrified loomed over the entrance, dust blowing through the barren branches. 

The former pond had long since dried up, the obelisk replaced by the statue of some famous person born, according to the plaque, ten thousand years after Donna. Beside it stood a small boy in Victorian clothing, his back to them as he cowered in the face of the three metre tall iguanodon. The dinosaur's tail crushed the back of a 1963 MG sports car, the businessman occupant running for shelter in the skyscraper. 

In the shadow of the temple’s door the four stood, pure horror etched on the faces of the humans. A steely control closed the Doctor’s expression into a mask of neutrality. Max stepped towards the edge of the shadow, appalled and awed in equal measure. 

"Best not draw its attention," the Doctor said, his voice deathly quiet. "That’s a herbivore but I wouldn’t trust anything that powerful when it’s scared, and that poor creature is terrified." 

Max gulped. "The wormhole has done this?" 

The Doctor nodded, "Unintentionally, yes." 

"Oh my god," Donna whispered, "That’s a child. He’s going to get crushed if he stays there." 

"No, Donna, don’t you dare…." the Doctor started by it was too late, Donna was already running out of the relative safety of the building towards the boy. ".... oh why do you never listen?" 

He spun round to the Torchwood staff, "Get back inside and monitor the tunnel. I’ll…" 

Before he finished Darijus lept off the step chasing Donna. The Doctor blocked Max’s intention to follow.

"Max, I know you want to help, and the best way you can do that is to keep that tunnel steady. We’re in big trouble already, if we shift now everyone outside will be lost in an instant and we have no hope of saving the planet. Please, please, don’t fight me on this." 

Max watched as Donna scooped the young boy off his feet and the iguanodon swung round, the movement of Donna and Darijus catching its attention. 

"I’ll keep the tunnel stable," Max nodded. "I swear." 

Without another word Max ran back inside, and the Doctor spun on his heel and charged after the others. 

Donna had not thought about the rescue in advance, her attention focused on the boy in his sailor suit. Now she held the child in her arms, his screams and thrashing made it difficult to keep him safe. Behind them the dinosaur, already panicked, struck out with its tail, breaking chunks from the buildings, its great feet squashing everything as it spun like a rabid animal. 

Somewhere nearby a woman screamed, a car alarm sounded, music blared from a ghetto blaster and Donna looked in every direction, disorientated. From her right Darijus appeared and took the wailing child from her arms, holding him to his chest as though he weighed no more than a baby. His other hand gripped Donna’s elbow and steered her round into the path of the Doctor who was glaring at her fiercely. 

There was a crack and rubble descended on them from above, fine grit followed by lumps of masonry showered over them. The terrified iguanodon screeched in terror and broke into a lumbering run, heading towards their position. Hemmed in they were forced to change course. Their feet pounded across ash as they stumbled over the edge of the dried out pond. Donna fell and was hauled on by the Doctor who was half step in front. Darijus, still with the child in his arms, lagged a step behind. 

On the other side of the temple the boy’s nanny hugged another small child to her breast. Her cream dress billowed in the stiff, hot breeze that blew between the wasted trees and a busy chip shop. The Doctor skidded to a stop beside the woman and she grabbed the boy from Darijus’ arms, scurrying into the remains of tram without a word. 

"We have to help them!" Donna cried. "Can’t they come with us?" 

"And do what?" the Doctor challenged. "If they go into the hub, that’s where they’ll stay. In the wrong time, potentially trapped for the rest of their short lives in a place most of them won’t understand." 

"But…" 

"But nothing," Darijus said as he pulled Donna into a crouch, shielding her from a blast of mortar that was knocked through the air. "To save them, we must save ourselves. This cannot happen if we find a means of stopping the wormhole." 

"Exactly!" the Doctor was on his knees, squeezing through a doorway half buried in the earth. "Get in here!" 

Donna hesitated but Darijus had heard the same thing as the Doctor and he shoved Donna without remorse, pushing her through the hole and into the Doctor’s waiting arms. From somewhere to the south, over the river, came the low drone of engines. Propellers and a distant chugging noise filled the sky, a cloud of ancient mechanical war birds paired left and right around the skyscraper, their payload beginning to drop as Darijus scurried into the hole beside them. 

"Well this is a fine mess," Darijus grunted as he withdrew from the sunken doorway. "I did not expect to be bombed by the Luftwaffe today." 

"I didn’t expect to see a dinosaur in Chiswick," Donna replied, "Or a tram upside down on the lawn out there." 

The ground shook as bombs hit the ground, the cement roof of the building cracking with the impact and dust showering them as they hunkered on the ground. 

"I don’t think this ceiling will hold long," the Doctor observed as a lump of cement landed near him, "We may have to make a dash for it." 

"Past the dinosaur?" Donna asked. 

"Unless you have a better idea?" he snapped at her, "If you’d stayed in the temple…." 

"Like you would have left a child to die," she countered, piercing him with a glare. 

Outside the airplane engines swung around for a second pass. 

"We should go, now." Darijus cut in, pointing at the huge crack that had developed across the ceiling. 

The Doctor hauled himself up to the door and rapidly dropped to the floor again as the wretched scream of the dinosaur pierced their ears from directly above, "Probably best not for the minute." 

With a sigh Donna slid down to the floor and sat, leaning against the wall. Darijus took a perch next to her and slipped his hand into hers. The Doctor, for whom patience was a trial, paced in the dust, listening to the sound of his shoes on the floor and focusing his mind. 

"It is a great shame that we cannot simply turn back time," Darijus said, "Except if that were to happen I should not have been fortunate enough to meet you, Donna." 

"You can’t just turn time back," the Doctor responded distantly, "It doesn’t work that way. We’re part of a loop now, I can’t cross the time streams. That’s dangerous enough as it is, within the wormhole it would be cataclysmic." 

Donna laughed, "I think it’s cataclysmic as it is." 

"I can’t shut down the programme from the computer, it’s too corrupted, too advanced. It can think a million times more quickly than me and it has learnt to anticipate our actions."

"That brings us back to turning off the power," Darijus said, "And we know that the generator is wired into an underground heat source through a tunnel that has been sealed shut for decades." 

"We can’t unplug it because the computer is monitoring our actions and the second we try to release the connection we will be zapped, like Max." Donna leant against Darijus feeling secure in his arms. 

"Which means we need to attack this from another angle…" the Doctor stopped pacing turning to look at Donna and Darijus with excitement in his eyes. "Not from another angle, from another time!" 

"You what?" 

Donna’s scathing remark dropped off his shoulders without denting his enthusiasm. 

"What if we go back further, to when that tunnel isn’t sealed shut with twenty feet of cement and rocks?" 

Darijus’ forehead creased with a deep frown, "You intend to shut off the supply in the past? But this cannot be done. With every time-shift the hub remains intact. Here it is always 2008." 

"I don’t intend to shut it off in the past. I intend to get through the tunnel in the past and ride the wave of a forward jump to cut the power as we return to normal time." 

"No," Darijus shook his head furiously, "That would be suicide. Even if we could control the direction to the time shift you would be in immense danger." 

"If I don’t the world is in immense danger." 

"Unacceptable!" 

"You can’t be serious!" 

The Doctor looked from Donna to Darijus. "Do you want the entire world devoured? Did you see it out there? And that, that’s nothing. That’s 1973 with chunks of time on the doorstep. What happens with the next shift? Or the one after that?" 

Neither of the humans replied and the Doctor to the floor, grabbing a lump of cement and drew a swirling circle of the floor that looked like an oversized plug hole. 

"This is the wormhole, the time tunnel." He said gesturing to the whole drawing. "Time is in flux and with every twist or shift we become tied in.  The closer you get to the centre the more areas of time are pressed together." 

Donna nodded. 

"We are somewhere here," he jabbed the rock into one of the higher up swirls. "The edges of time are bleeding together. How much longer we have I can't be sure…." 

"We’re on the lip of the Niagara Falls!" Donna remembered, "Hanging on the edge and trying not to be dragged in." 

He beamed, "Exactly." 

Darijus took the rock from the Doctor’s hand and dropped it in the centre of the swirl. "And this is where the hub sits. Dragging everything into the centre, the gravity." 

The smile on the Doctor’s face faltered. 

"What does that mean?" Donna asked, seeing his change in posture and feeling a deep, unsettled sensation in the pit of her stomach. 

"It just means the hub is at the centre of things," he replied carefully, "And we’ve known that for a while. That’s why it is always here, whenever we time shift." 

"As long as it has power, this wormhole will continue to spin. We have to cut off the energy and cap the void." Darijus was succinct. "We have the cap, and, it would appear, you have the power." 


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9 

"What the hell do you mean, 'you have the cap'?" Donna demanded, staring Darijus in the eye. There was a note of fear in her voice, her subconscious mind processing what her conscious mind refused to accept.

"To stop the wormhole we have to kill the power," the Doctor's words were slow, calculated. "But when the time tunnel stops spinning, it will collapse in on itself. At the speed at which it is rotating, without something to stop it, the spin it will invert and time will lap over itself. The result would be cataclysmic. The hub will act as a stopper, holding the wormhole stable until it ceases to exist." 

"And the plug is… the hub?" Donna blanched, her face dropping. "With us inside it?" 

The Doctor's eyes shifted, unable to meet her fear filled look. "Not us... Donna, I'm sorry. There isn't a choice. Not this time." 

"And when you say 'not us' you mean the four of us, don't you?" She watched his eyes fill with a familiar sorrow and her heart sank with such speed she thought she may vomit. "No... no… please! Doctor, please! Tell me you can save Darijus and Max! Tell me they won’t die…." 

Darijus took her hands in his, "My dear Donna, sometimes there are no other choices." 

"There are always other choices!" She gripped his hands until his knuckles turned white. "There have to be other choices. What happens when the wormhole collapses? What happens to the hub then?" 

"It will probably be compressed to nothing," Darijus’ voice was steady, resigned. 

"I'll try to set this up as a remote connection." The Doctor promised. "I will do everything I can to save everyone." 

Donna stared at him in silence, her heart hammering in her chest. A familiar darkness swamped his face, sadness welling in his eyes. It was an expression she had seen before and it scared her. 

"Then why do you look as though Darijus and Max are already dead?" 

It was Darijus who saved the Doctor, his voice gentle but firm. "Because he is a man who makes difficult decisions. He is a man who knows time. I have read your files, Doctor. They speak of those left behind, those that die in your name. Those files speak of you as a destroyer of worlds. One who leaves behind a wave of death. But they are wrong. You save everyone you can, but there is always a price. You are a brave man, Doctor. Your heart must weigh more than the universe." 

Darijus laid Donna’s hands in her lap and stood, crossing to the Doctor he gripped his upper arms, meeting his eye without fear. 

"You are owed a debt of gratitude that can never be repaid." 

The Doctor shook his head. "No, I am owed nothing." 

"Thank you, Doctor, for saving this world and for bearing more sorrow than any human could." Darijus pulled the Doctor into a bear hug which the Doctor returned with surprise and discomfort. 

As he drew the Doctor close Darijus whispered. "Do not worry about us. Save Donna and yourself." 

The Doctor swallowed the lump in his throat and nodded into the other man’s shoulder. "Whatever happens, I will save her." 

"Good man." Darijus replied and slapped the Doctor twice hard on the back. "Now, we have the Luftwaffe and a dinosaur to dodge if we wish to make a safe return. May I suggest we make a run for it after the next pass?" 

Still sat on the floor Donna nodded in agreement although unsure of the question. Her heart still swam in her stomach and her thoughts were consumed with a fog that dulled out everything except the looming prospect of a great loss. She found herself hauled to her feet by Darijus’ strong arms and guided to the buried door. 

Above the earth shook as the bombers passed overhead. The propellers churned up the air as the bombs obliterated the land. Billowing clouds of dust and smoke rose from the strikes which were landing close by now every few seconds. In front of her Darijus pulled himself up and through the opening, grovelling in the dirt to the relative safety of an overturned car where he cast his gaze skywards, shielding his eyes from the brightness of the orange sky. 

"Donna..." the Doctor was talking to her, his words distant and vague. 

"Donna, I need you to focus. Listen to me." 

She stared at him, half blind, watching his lips move, blinking. 

"We’re going to run for it when Darijus gives the all clear. Are you ready?" The Doctor’s hands were on her shoulders, shaking her a little. 

Donna blinked again and water dripped onto her cheeks. "Don’t let him die." 

He raised a hand from her shoulder to wipe the tears away but she reached up and grasped his hand with both of hers, holding it so tight he could see the fingers on both their hands turning white. 

"Please?" she begged, "Please swear you will save them both?" 

He opened his mouth but not words came and he shook his head, helpless. Donna knew the look and though it was a vow he could not, make her heart screamed. Above them the German plans roared.

"Promise me!" she shouted above the din. 

"Donna… I will do everything..." 

"No!" she insisted, squeezing her grip tighter still. "That’s not good enough!" 

From outside the door Darijus appeared, his face covered in dirt, his hand reaching down into the room. 

"Come on!" he yelled and grabbed Donna’s other hand, twisting her away from the Doctor and pulling her as she scrabbled out of the cellar against her will.

The Doctor followed behind, sliding out of the room on his stomach and pushing himself into a run behind Darijus as he dragged Donna from one sheltered spot to another. The street was littered with debris. A child’s spinning top lay shattered in pieces on the floor next to the wheel of a 1950 scooter. Old newspapers flew on the dust filled wind and broken glass from the skyscraper covered the floor. The air stank of blood, fear and death. Somewhere nearby the dinosaur, hit in one of the bomb blasts, screamed in pain. 

Above them a stray bomber made his last pass over the area, flying so low that his face was visible through the glass of his windshield. His petrified stare burnt into the Doctor’s hearts making him turn away as the plane wing clipped the edge of the skyscraper and spun out of control, plummeting towards the earth. 

They fell over the threshold of the temple in a straggling mess of arms and legs. Scrambling away from the intense heat and horrific sounds of the plane’s explosion, they braced for the detonation of the remaining bombs. Darijus hurried Donna towards the underground passageway while the Doctor held back, turning to see again the destruction outside. A memory burned within him and he shied away from it, stuffing his hands into his pockets and staring at the inferno outside, the heat still chiding his face. 

"Doctor!" 

Darijus’ shout broke him from his reverie and he turned and strode back to the passage without uttering a word. 

Max met them at the door to the computer lab, keyboard now slung round the neck like a 1980s musician, a strap glued in a circle to either end of the wireless device. Donna’s tear stained face silenced Max's first words and on instinct Max hurried across and wrapped skinny arms around Donna’s back and drew her close, feeling the subtle shaking in her limbs. 

Darijus was behind Donna and he shook his head at Max's unasked questions. Behind him was the Doctor, dark faced and brooding. 

"Is that what the future, Doctor?" Max asked, "Is this our fault?" 

The Doctor shook his head, "It’s not fixed. None of that will happen if I can get us out of this mess, reverse the loop and cut the power." 

Max queried, "But what about Ellie, Arjun and Colonel Garde?" 

"I’m sorry Max, time doesn’t work that way. I can’t bring the dead back to life. The disappearance of Torchwood 4 is a fixed point in time. This hub in the focal point. Everything that happens here is unchangeable." 

"But we can save the world," Darijus stepped in, placing a hand on Donna and Max's shoulders. 

Under his hand Darijus felt Donna stiffen. 

"We have to shift," the Doctor announced, "Max, let me have control of the computer. I’m going to drive this thing whether it likes it, or not." 

"Where are we going?" Max gave Donna another squeeze then swung the keyboard to the Doctor and pulled a second chair to the computer terminal. 

"Back in time," he replied, turning to Darijus. "According to the records when was that tunnel blocked up?" 

"In the 1970s," Darijus answered. He too had left Donna’s side and was fighting his way into the safe room, pushing past broken equipment and sending it skittering across the floor. "Torchwood took possession of this building in 1972 and blocked off the other passageways in 1973, after they laid the power cables." 

"Right then," the Doctor flexed his fingers making them crack. "Everyone hold on to something. This will be a bumpy ride." 

With the same exuberance he used to pilot the TARDIS the Doctor hammered the keyboard, tutting and sucking air through his teeth as the screen flickered and swirled. From the safe room Darijus extracted bolt cutters, ratchet straps and a host of other smaller items which he dumped into a waste paper bin and dragged across the floor. At the Doctor’s side Max watched and listened, taking instructions from the Doctor as they went. 

"We’re going back to about 1970," the Doctor told Max, pointing at the point on the screen where a small blip was visible in the wormhole, "It’s a bit vague, this isn’t your standard Time Travel machine - we are using a pneumatic drill to break open a pistachio shell. If I get this wrong and we don’t go far enough back, then we’ll have to shift again; and a shorter hop will be more problematic than a bigger one. Every time we shift we’re causing more damage to time. There will become a point where I can’t do anything to save us so it is important we get this right. If we go too far back in time, then the next part of the plan will fail before we’ve even started." 

Max watched in amazement as the Doctor typed in equations hundreds of characters long without hesitating. 

"I don’t suppose you have a joy stick around here do you?" the Doctor asked, scanning the room. "It would make your life a lot easier in a minute if you do." 

With a huge grin Max ran to the other side of the room and from a small cupboard under another desk pulled out a state-of-the-art gaming joystick, modified with additional wires and buttons from another device. 

"My prototype," Max said proudly, plugging it into the USB port and sticking the device to the desk with rubber suckers that had were glued to the bottom. "Six programmable keys on the grip, hyper responsive, additional fast keys here, here and here and touch pad for precision." 

A nod of approval from the Doctor made Max blush. 

"Nice work, Max." The Doctor’s eyes flickered up as he spoke. "I’ve written a series of actions which you can programme to your keys now. They take us forward and backward in time - parameters are variable and I haven’t tried this so we could go drastically wrong, but let’s keep trying."

Max's blush faded with a rush of fear.

"These two," The Doctor continued, indicating to two lines of code. "These are buffers. They will help us shift without the earthquake sensation and they might just be the difference between me blacking out again." 

Max nodded, "Understood. And these codes?" 

"Anchors," the Doctor said shortly. "I don’t want to use them unless I have to. They will lock the hub in place. It won't just be a fixed point in time it will be a permanent point in time. If that happens there is nothing I can do. We will be stuck here, forever, with the rest of the universe collapsing on itself." 

"So why did you write them?" Max pushed on. 

"Because we have a hole that needs plugging, and I’m going to use the hub to do it. We need to be somewhere else when that happens." 

"Donna," Darijus called, shaking her from her stupor. "Take these straps and tie down the computers and anything else that may shake loose during a shift. You know how to use them?" 

"Yeah," Donna said, demonstrating the ratchet as she looped the belt around the Doctor’s computer. "You don’t take my gramps in a trailer tent to Bognor Regis without knowing how to tie everything down. We’d have lost mum’s suitcase of undies if I hadn’t strapped it to the roof of the car." 

"Excellent!" Darijus beamed at her. "I will be back shortly. There are items in my office we will need." 

Doctor turned to Max. "Max, I need another keyboard and mouse, there’s aren’t enough controls here." 

"There are some in the store." Max picked up the Doctor's subtext and followed Darijus out of the room.

An uneasy silence descended and the Doctor put down the keyboard and turned to Donna who was pulling tight the last ratchet. 

"Donna," his tone was gentle and measured and he watched as she took a long deep breath and pulled herself to her full height, straightening every vertebrae. "Donna, I promise I will do everything I can to get the four of us out of here." 

Her shoulders, hunched and prepared for argument, dropped a little and she turned, hope and fear writhing in her eyes. 

"I know you can’t promise to save them," she answered, her voice husky with emotion. "I’ve travelled with you long enough to know that. And I always knew you would try. It’s just… different… this time." 

"Because of Darijus?" he asked and her head bobbed in response. 

"I just thought, you know, that he’s a nice guy, and that he’s from my own time…" a bitter laugh died on her lips, "It’s stupid I know." 

He smiled at her, "There’s nothing stupid about feeling something for someone. You wouldn’t be the first companion I left behind for love." 

"Oi!" her voice strengthen with aggravation, "It’s a bit soon to be talking about love! We’ve not even had a date." 

"I left my granddaughter behind, oh so long ago now," a sad smile crossed his lips, "She hadn’t known David very long either…" 

"No-one is leaving anyone behind." Donna snapped, "You bring me back to earth often enough, is it that hard to conceive me having a relationship AND travelling with you?" 

"This isn’t Pompei," he said, "Everyone can survive this."

"I’m sorry for overreacting… again," she looked to the floor, averting her eyes from him for a moment before raising her head. "Are we good?" 

He smiled, "Always, Donna Noble. You and me, we are always good. More than that, we’re amazing. Spectacular. Best mates and all that." 

"Good," she sighed as the weight shifted from her shoulders. "But you've been talking too much and not been paying attention, dumbo. Something’s happening on the screen." 

The Doctor spun back to the computer. "No, no! There’s should be a siren, I programmed an alarm…" 

Behind him Donna sniggered with laughter. "Best mates can always catch you out." 

 

Exhaustion was drawn of every face when the Doctor summoned the small group around Max’s computer. After hours of work the computer was unrecognisable. Strapped to the desk the case was open and a host of wires poked out in all directions. Each wire connected to a multitude of other devices, keyboards, mice and monitors. The Doctor’s pleasure in his work was evident as he duct taped the last miniature keyboard to the desk and spun around in the chair. The components formed a semicircle around him, an array of monitors raised high and tilted down so that the chair’s incumbent could recline and work, the lower position enabling access to a strip of switches taped the side of the desk. 

Three sets of eyes stared at the array with various degrees of awe and terror. Max's science fiction filled head ogled the setup, examining every element without touching, afraid that the Doctor’s rapidly constructed supercomputer would be too delicate for mere human use. Darijus appreciated the construction while Donna shook her head in amazement. 

"Did you really need all these extra bits?" she asked, prodding the edge of one keyboard but not touching the keys. 

"Yes," his smug response making her lips twist into a half smile. "I did. And it works, so Donna, don’t touch it, eh?" 

She rolled her eyes and took a perch on the other desk next to Darijus. 

"Your plan is complete?" Darijus asked, taking a seat beside Max. 

"More or less," the Doctor said with a casual shrug. "I like a little room to manoeuvre." 

"Room to make it up on the spot you mean," she muttered with a wink. 

He feigned a hurt look and continued. "I am going to shift us back to 1970 or thereabouts. Then, on my own, I will run down that passageway, head overland to the nearest access point to the closed passage and climb in. Darijus, you have the map for me?" 

Darijus produced a map sealed in an A4 plastic wallet which he had taped shut at the other end. 

"The nearest access point is half a mile along the shaft," Darijus pointed to the spot on the map. "If this is not accessible, there is another at the mile mark, then two miles. Your last resort is the entry point by the river." 

Nodding his thanks the Doctor slipped the wallet into his inside pocket. 

"Why can’t we just walk through the tunnel when it opens at this end?" Donna asked, "If we go back to 1970 won’t the passage just be unsealed?" 

"The hub is sitting in a slowly expanding bubble of time that’s holding Max and Darijus hostage. Everything inside that bubble is protected when we shift, nothing here changes with the time period. I have to get beyond the influence of this protected sphere and into 1970, where the passage will be unsealed.”

Donna nodded her understanding. “So we…”

“We aren’t going anywhere," he told her with a tone that declined argument. "This is a solo mission. Max and Darijus will need your help here." 

Donna opened her mouth to object but Darijus caught her eye and shook his head. 

"Then we have the tricky part. Max will force a jump forward, but to make sure I don’t get stuck in another time zone I have to connect to the hub. That’s where this little beauty comes in." 

He lifted a small laptop from the table that had been stripped and rewired with it’s monitor inverted so that the screen was visible at all times and the keys were on the back. Silver duct tape held the components together.

"What’s that?" Donna said with a sigh, realising he was waiting for an opportunity to explain. 

"I’m glad you asked," he grinned. "This is part one of a three part device, a locator beacon that triangulates your position and ties you to the main computer right here. These three devices will keep me tied to you, and some very strong rope will give me something to hang on to as we shift forward again. I’m going to surf a wave of time back into the future so I can cut the power cables the second we normalise in 2008. That will stop the software, which will throw the wormhole out of its loop and the hub will fall into place, sealing the wormhole from reopening." 

"You’re going to ride a wave of time?" Donna echoed. "Outside the hub?" 

Darijus was shaking his head again, "Doctor we have discussed this before. This idea is suicide." 

"No, no it’s not. Not with the locator beacon working." 

"And what if you black out again?" Donna demanded. "You can’t do this on your own." 

"I’ve added some dampeners to soften the blow," he insisted and moved on, "The bigger problem is you won’t be able to contact me while I’m outside, so you won’t know where I am and if I’ve got there in time." 

Max frowned, "So how will I know when to start the next shift?" 

"You won’t." 

"I really dislike this plan," Darijus muttered. 

The Doctor looked at him darkly, "If you have a better one let’s hear it because we haven’t got long." 

Darijus opened his hands wide and shook his head. 

"Right then," the Doctor turned back to Max. "I have set a timer to cut in as soon as we complete the next jump. It gives me 2 hours to get into position. That’s allowing for having to run to the river and back. When that alarm goes off you have to follow my instructions to the letter. Any deviation will kill one of us, all of us, or make the wormhole spin faster and kill everyone."

He paused and waited for Max's nod of understanding before continuing. 

"The instructions are all written on the desk," he looked sheepish, "Sorry, I think that’s permanent ink." 

"And if you aren’t in position?" Max asked.

"Let’s hope that doesn’t happen," he replied and turned to Darijus. "Darijus you need to be monitoring the generator. When we shift forward there will be a dip in the power. It should cut out if I’ve done my job properly, but I’ve factored in a safety which I think the software will obey. For 20 seconds after the shift the power will drop to fifty percent, I’ve diverted power to the dampeners and the software should think it needs to warm back up with caution in case of an overload. But we can’t test it on the jump back because the artificial intelligence will probably adapt to it. That’s why Max will turn it on just as we shift forward - instruction seventeen, Max." 

"You want me to cut the power from this end as well?" 

The Doctor nodded, "Make sure you are insulated. Even at 10% power that generator can kill if you aren’t dressed for the occasion." 

"Understood, Doctor." 

The Doctor turned to Donna and saw a staunch, rebellious, look plastered on her face. 

"Donna, I need you here, with the third part of the triangulation device. You are my anchor. Keep this device on you at all times. It doesn’t matter where you are in the hub as long as you are in it. Help Max, help Darijus, but don’t leave the hub. Okay?" 

"I don’t see why…." 

"Donna Noble," the Doctor started, his tone unusually stern, "I don’t think I have ever told you this, but please, on this one occasion... Don’t argue and do as I ask." 

Caught off guard Donna stuttered and snapped her jaw shut, anger rising in her as she pulled her shoulders tight and glared at her friend angrily. 

"Fine." she snapped, "But I still think this is one of the worst ideas you have ever had." 

"Well," he said with a sigh, "As long as I’m the only one thinking positive..." 

He turned back to the computer and punched the return key. 

"Allons-y!"


	10. Chapter 10

With the Doctor's alterations the time shift was, as promised, a far less brutal experience. Though the room shook and the painful tingling was still present both were far less violent and as they stabilised in the new zone, the Doctor grinned at Donna with an 'I told you so' look. Even Darijus smiled and slapped the Doctor on the back in congratulations.

Max offered the Doctor a hand as they switched places and the Doctor stared at it for a moment in confusion.

"In case anything goes wrong," Max said. "Thank you for trying."

The Doctor took Max's hand in a firm, short, handshake. "I'll see you later. I'll take you for a spin in the TARDIS when I get back."

A beam of pleasure made Max's face glow. "That would be fantastic!"

Picking up the two triangulation devices the Doctor looped one over Donna's shoulder so it hung at her side like a high-tech handbag,or a tricorder on Star Trek. Slipping off his jacket he lifted the two belts of his devices and hung it against his chest, the straps crossing at the back. Darijus pulled the clasps tight and Donna helped the Doctor back into his jacket and coat as he experimented shifting the weight on his shoulders. On top of this Darijus deposited a hefty coil of rope which the Doctor wore as a bandolier. At each end of the rope shiny metal carabiners were expertly knotted.

He led a fast pace up the passage, and when they reached the junction they all stopped. Darijus slapped the Doctor's shoulder again, catching his hand and shaking it hard.

"Good luck, Doctor."

"And you Darijus," he nodded in Donna's direction. "Look after each other."

"Of course," Darijus replied then turned to Donna, a smile on his lips. "I will be in the office when you return."

"Come one, spaceman," Donna pointed towards the exit, "I'll walk up with you. I want to make sure you got the calculations right. If we've ended up in 1570 instead, you'll have a bleeding long wait."

At the entrance the pool was once again full of water. The area was green with mown grass but a hay cart and horse stood in the middle of the field and a confused farmer clung to the horse's bridle.

"Do you know what year it is?" Donna asked.

He sniffed the air and closed his eyes, aligning his senses, "1969. Autumn."

"I'm amazed that actually worked. I didn't think all those wires were for show." She gave him a gentle nudge with her elbow, "You flew the hub through time better than you fly the TARDIS."

The disgruntled look on his face made her laugh as he replied.

"To be fair, I was just ripping through time here, the TARDIS is travelling in space as well." The Doctor opened his arms to Donna, and she hugged him.

"I'll see you later, spaceman," she said. "Be careful out there."

Setting off at a jog the Doctor was soon beyond Donna's view. A few hundred metres from the temple he passed through an invisible wall and stumbled. The ground under his feet was hard, the air was dry, and the sun was on his back sending warming heat through his clothes into chilled skin. He shivered as the warmth seeped into his body, bracing against the effects of the last shift which, though much improved, still made him queasy. In the distance he could hear the sounds of shipping on the river, and the big house seemed to have a party in full swing - clearly unaware of the strange pieces of history that were roaming their grounds.

Approaching the first access hatch the Doctor slowed and pulled the map out of his pocket. In appearance the hatch resembled a drain cover. Concealed by the browning grass he had almost walked passed it, soil had covered the metal and grass had grown in the grooves of the grate. With a handy stone he scored the edge of the grating and scoured the top in search of a bolt but there was not one visible.

"You're not going to make this easy, are you?" he muttered, brandishing the sonic and searching for a lock inside the grate. The sonic screwdriver whirred but produced no results. The grate was shut tight, welded from beneath. With a low groan he clambered back to his feet.

He broke into a run this time, legs stretching and arms pumping as he could feel time slipping away. The second access hatch was, according to the future map, in the middle of a housing estate, beside an electrical substation. As neither were likely to have been built in 1969 the Doctor hoped that the access column was visible and accessible.

The open scrub land was dry, blades of yellowed knee high grass bowing out of the way as the Doctor ran through them. In the water filled crater left from a World War Two bomb blast a group of children played with boats, some dressed in jeans, others in far older clothes. More people caught up in the time shifts. The children were safe, he thought as his hearts tugged in different directions, and children were very adaptable. They would be all right as long as he got to the job done.

A group of teens on bikes cycled towards him at speed, shouting something indecipherable. As they reached him the one at the front, exertion making his face as red as his sweater, yelled.

"Don't go that way, mister, the grounds falling in!"

"What do you mean?" the Doctor asked, spinning to follow the boy's rapid departure.

"There's a tunnel, way down in the ground," a second boy yelled. "Just over the ridge. It collapsed!"

The third cyclist, a girl, yelled from behind, "Geoff! You wait for me or I'll set my Dad on you."

Geoff, the boy in the red, skidded to a stop. "Come on, Chrissie! My dad will kill us both if he finds out we were here."

The Doctor did not turn to watch them leave but heard the clunking of their bike chains and their panting breaths move away, up the bank behind him and onto an access road the other side of the bomb pond.

Following the path left in the grass by the bikes he found the edge of the tunnel with ease. The roof had given way and on what appeared to be another junction point in the system. A great dish of land had fallen in creating a deep pit with steep sides and loose soil. Sliding down the steep slope in a mixture of hops and skids the Doctor missed a step and tumbled. With a grunt he hit the earth face first, the laptop on his chest crushing his ribs with an audible crack, before the forward motion forced him into a barrel roll and a rapid descent over the last twenty feet.

Landing on his front, arms crossed against his chest to protect the laptop, he heaved a deep breath, damp soil filling his nostrils. He laid there for a minute, breathing hard and feeling the ache in his chest.

"Hey, Mister!" a man's voice called from above.

On the bank above him a middle-aged man in blue security fatigues peered over the edge, testing the ground with a hesitant foot.

"Hey, you down there? Are you hurt?"

The Doctor groaned and rolled onto his side, hauling himself upright and brushing the dirt away from his jacket.

"All fine," he called back up, "I'm an inspector of tunnels, inspecting this... tunnel."

"I've been patrolling this land for 6 months," the man said, his suspicions raised by the Doctor's less than convincing lie. "This wasn't here yesterday. How did you find out about it so fast?"

"Well I sort of fell into it."

As the Doctor blinked away the dirt from his eyes, he could see the man in more detail. Short, stocky, with a dark beard and greying hair there was something about him that the Doctor found uncomfortably familiar.

The guard took a few steps down the bank sending an avalanche of earth cascading.

"No!" shouted the Doctor, "Don't come down. It's not safe."

The security man hesitated. "What are you doing here, anyway? This is a secured site for government. How did you get in?"

"Same way the kids did," the Doctor replied. "They told me about the tunnel."

"Those damn kids," he moaned. "If I'd found my Sylvia messing about on a place like this, I'd have given her what for."

With an internal groan the Doctor felt another piece of jigsaw snap into place. "Are you, by any chance, Wilfred Mott?"

Wilfred Mott nodded with suspicion written over his face. "Here, how do you know that? You can't read my name badge from that distance can you?"

The Doctor shook his head, "No, no… I spoke to your… boss… before coming here. He was supposed to tell you to expect me. I'd show you my credentials but I'm a bit stuck at the moment."

Wilf held his ground and at the distance it was difficult to read his face with complete accuracy but he seemed unconvinced. "Well, as you can't go anywhere at the moment, I have plenty of time to get back to the office and call my manager. I'll come back with a few ropes and all."

"That would be great," the Doctor beamed. "I'll just hang about here and maybe have a little look in the tunnel."

"You stay out of there till I get back!" Wilfred called, gesturing to a gun holstered on his hip, "I'm not a violent man…"

"... but you're doing your duty for her majesty," the Doctor finished for him, turning his back on the tunnel and pulling off a relaxed salute. "God save the queen. It's fine, I'll stay right here and wait for you to get back."

"God save the Queen," he replied with a crisp salute. Wilf's other hand moved away from the gun he was loathed to use. "I'll be back in an hour."

With that Donna's grandfather ran off in a lolloping gate which until now the Doctor had put down to old age. As soon as Wilfred was out of sight he made his way across the uneven earth to the tunnel entry. Though half covered with debris, the soil was loose enough for the Doctor to scoop out a hole big enough for him to squeeze through and he forced his way into the rank darkness.

"Darijus, come in please."

Max's voice crackled over the radio sat beside Donna on Darijus' desk. While Darijus' had gone to find the tools necessary to cut the power at their end Donna had elected to make coffee. It was the only thing she could think of to help and sitting still made her restless and irritable. She should be out there with the Doctor, not holed up in an underground hub where it was 'safe'.

Donna knew why the Doctor had wanted her to stay. It wasn't just about her safety, although Donna was under no illusions about how insane his plan actually was. This was also his way of saying he would be back and he would save Darijus and Max. Donna picked up the radio and held in the big red button on the side.

"Max, Darijus' is in the store. What's up?"

There was a pause then Max's voice came back. "I think we have a problem. I've lost the Doctor's signal."

"What do you mean lost his signal?" Donna demanded as she barged through the door to the computer lab. "How can you lose his signal?"

Max gestured to the triangulation device around her neck, "His unit isn't sending anything back. I've been checking for the last ten minutes, but it's gone."

"Well fix it!" Donna pleaded, "You must be able to do something!"

Max through Donna look of desperate exasperation. "I can't! There's nothing wrong with the computer, it's his device. It was checking in every ninety seconds but then it blipped. Missed two check ins, hit the next one, and hasn't checked in since."

Darijus strode through the door behind them, "Could it be because he is now in the passageway?"

"I don't think so," Max replied. "If he's in the tunnel he's closer to us than he was above ground. But look at the check in points… there's rapid movement between the last few check ins. The distance between the points is similar in miles but significantly lower in the earth over a short space of time. I think he fell, or the unit did."

"Damn it," Donna looked at the device around her neck. It was a hurried creation, and one that could be damaged without great effort. "Can you make another one?"

Max's head shook, "Not quickly, I could copy that one but it would take me several hours at least. And that won't help anyway because we've got to get it to him."

"Without it we can't triangulate his position," Donna said. "It needs three points he said, this one, the computer and his."

Donna stared at the monitor and saw one red dot flashing at the centre of the screen next to a larger blue dot.

"Hang on," she said, her words rolling from her tongue with a slow realisation, "This is showing my position. The position of this unit. It's not triangulating anything."

"You need the three to show the coordination lines," Max said a touch too fast.

Donna's shoulders squared up, and she looked from Max to Darijus with a deepening sense of rage and dread.

"This isn't a triangulation device."

Neither of them would meet her eye.

"Is it?" she bellowed and Max quaked.

"No," Darijus responded. "It is to keep you locked to the time frame of the hub. So you cannot be lost during a shift."

"It was a safety measure," Max added. "To make sure you wouldn't be seperated from us."

She took a deep breath and completed the picture in her own mind. "So the Doctor is out there, about to ride a wave to time with nothing to lock him to this hub? Meaning he could fall, be lost in time, and not be able to cut the power at all?"

"That is an accurate understanding of the situation." Darijus' face was grave as he watched Donna compute the problem, her eyes turning from fear to a gritty determination.

She hefted the laptop that hung at her side and clutched it to her chest. It was a lifesaver now, and she held it close, afraid that it would be damaged by the slightest touch.

"I'm going after him," she said. "You can't stop me."

Darijus shook his head, "I would not expect to."

Max reached under the desk and pulled out a backpack, emptying the contents all over the floor.

"Put that in here," Max pointed at the laptop. "I'll tie the bag around it so it can't move. Darijus, give me your sweater. I'll use it for packing."

"How long have I got?" Donna asked, glancing at the timer set by the Doctor. It read fifty seven minutes. "Can you slow this down?"

"No," Max admitted unhappily, "The Doctor has locked it to start a chain of actions I can't complete on my own. If this is going to work, you will need to be with the Doctor by the time this hits zero."

"I will get another map," Darijus promised but Donna held him to the spot with her hand brushing his face.

"I can't read maps anyway," she said, "Just point me in the general direction and I'll find him."

"How?" Max asked.

Donna looked at the trail left by the Doctor's broken device. "Well, I don't think there are many 100ft deep holes round here."

"West North West at two hundred and eighty five degrees," Darijus had told her as she left pressing a compass into her hand with an arrow drawn in the right direction. Then, after a hesitation, he had leant over and kissed her on the lips. It had been a slow, savored moment. A lingering kiss, his hands brushing her cheeks and following the contours of her body. As she ran through the autumn grasses, she could still feel the prickle of his beard against her skin and the butterflies that filled her chest.

She had never been much of a runner. Physical Education was the lesson she liked to bunk off with Mary Elizabeth Squires. They would circle round and hide behind the bike shed at the edge of the rugby pitch, giggling at the tight shorts on the boys on the field. As she ran Donna wondered if she would have attended class if she had known she would spend her adult life running after a skinny spaceman and dodging weird, alien weapons.

Despite the oddities from other time periods the area looked much as Donna remembered it from her youth. The housing estate wasn't there, that wasn't built until she was a secondary school, but the access road to the military dock was. Just like in her day there were kids up on the road, they would have snuck through the barbed wire over on Fort Street and gone to play in the bomb ponds. Three kids on bikes were cycling fast back to the military police guard gate, which struck Donna as odd. She'd spent more of her early teens dodging the military police. Trouble. She thought. And if they were running away from it she was on the right course heading in the opposite direction.

An MP was on the road, running with an injured leg so that his stride was uneven. He spotted Donna and waved at her, both hands above his head and she felt her heart thud in her chest.

"Go back!" he shouted and Donna felt her skin prickle, "You shouldn't be here!"

"You have no idea," Donna muttered beneath her breath.

"Turn around and go back!" he shouted again. He was closer now and Donna could see the man was her grandfather. Young, fit and terribly smart in his uniform. "It's bad enough chasing the kids out of here but you're older than my daughter. You should know better! And that's two of you today!"

"Two?" Donna called back, "Oh you mean you've seen my partner. Where is he? Over there in a hole somewhere?"

Wilfred Mott looked at her with surprise, "Your partner?"

"Yeah," she drawled with faked disdain. "I work with him."

"Inspecting tunnels?" Wilf asked, standing just above her on the edge of the road. "That's no job for a woman."

"It's 1969, women's lib hasn't made much of an impact yet." she muttered to herself, biting back an angry response. "He's something of a liability, always getting into trouble. Needs a woman to keep him on track."

"Ah, oh, I see," Wilf said, not understanding at all, but it would clearly be one of those days and there was something about the woman he trusted. She had the same kind eyes as his son-in-law and the chin of his Sylvia. "Well he's in trouble all right. Fell into a great big hole back along. I came from there about 15 minutes ago. I don't suppose you've got any ID on you have you?"

Donna shook her head and backed away, "No, sorry. He carries that. I should probably look after the paperwork in future."

"You be careful over there," he told her, "It's not safe!"

"Don't worry, Gramps," she said, kicking herself instantly. "I'll be fine. I'll see you later."

Turning on her heel Donna sprinted away as her grandfather stared after her, complaining about the modern woman and how he wasn't old enough to be her grandfather.

The passageway stunk of damp and moulding earth. Unused for a hundred years the floor held pools of stagnant water and loose bricks jutted out from the ceiling at head height. Underfoot time and water had degraded the cement and loosened bricks littered the floor making the Doctor trip as he ran. Pulling a head torch from his pocket he strapped it to his forehead and pressed on.

Travelling underground was a slow and painful process. According to Darijus' research a new connection to the geothermal power point had been installed during the buildings recommission work of 2006. It was located on the other side of the twenty foot deep concrete seal, which meant travelling almost the same distance underground as he had over it and it was taking twice as long.

A colony of rats, startled by his torch light, fled down the passage towards the new opening, their tiny claws scratching the bricks, bodies splashing through the puddles of stinking water. The nest reeked of decay and excrement. He used his arm to shield his nose as he passed by, trying not to suffocate in the stench. Like the other passageways it was damp and water dripped from the ceiling.

When he passed under the other access point The Doctor glanced up, pointing the powerful headlamp up the duct to see the welding from the other side. With visions of being buried alive he hurried on, counting his paces to measure the distance. If he got it wrong when they time shifted he wouldn't be on the other side of the cement plug, he would be inside it.

Darijus' research had shown a cross section in the tunnel ten metres from the cement stopper. According to the map these were both dead ends, short storage holes from days gone by. When at last The Doctor reached them he was disappointed to find they had collapsed, the edges visible, but the ground compressed solid from years of pressure from above. At either side there was a rotting metal handrail. It wasn't much to hold on to. Unleashing the coil of rope from around his shoulders he allowed himself a moment to breathe as the weight dropped to the floor.

Time was running out, he could sense it. Hooking one carabiner to the metal railing he tested it for strength putting all his weight into the line. Satisfied he clipped the other end to the other railing and repeated the test. There was a creak, but the metal held. Turning around to tie himself into the cord he knocked his head on the brick wall sending the head torch flying. In the pitch black he could see nothing so he unbuttoned his coat and jacket, stripping both from his back to use the laptop screen for little light. The darkness persisted.

"What the…?" he fumbled in the dark, finding his sonic in his trouser pocket.

Pointing the device at the laptop and a cry of frustration hissed through his lips. Damaged in his fall the laptop screen was off and though a battery light was flashing the sonic told him that the device was useless. Undoing the straps which held the device to his body his mind raced. The beacon was critical to the plan. Without it he was riding on the edge of time with nothing to lock him to the hub. Was he close enough to the hub to caught in the shift?

With no other options left to try the Doctor shoved the sonic into his mouth, holding it in place with his teeth. He unhooked one end of the rope and made a hasty harness that strapped around his waist clipping the carabiner back to the rusty handle he threw the full force of his body into his safety net. It held.

"I guess I can only hope that if this doesn't work Darijus can pull the plug at his end," the Doctor muttered.

Somewhere in the distance he heard a scurrying sound. The rats were on the move again. A low vibration shook the tunnel and pressed against his skin. It was the distinctive pull of the next time shift beginning and he winced in the pain it caused. On the cusp of the hub's protected zone the shift was slower. Torchwood 4 was being sucked out of time, and he was being dragged with it. With no torch, no electrical points, and no power cables there was no electrical charge, and no light. Dirt and water showered him in equal measure. In the pitch darkness the noise of the shaking earth made his blood run cold, and as the time shift moved up a gear the deep rooted ache in his bones ballooned into a private agony.

Tied between the two rusted hand holds like Odysseus he reeled with the pain, pulling against the rope as the wormhole twisted. He gripped the ropes until his hands were raw, his veins burning. With teeth bared he cried out, his head exploding as white hot pain pierced his skull. It was too late, he wasn't close enough to the hub to be carried directly with it. Instead he was falling in its wake, his connection to time ripped from him.

There was a light shining from behind him now. Sucking him in as it became brighter. Screwing his eyes shut he gripped the ropes until his knuckles hurt, the physical pain combining with the mental one until thought was impossible. Something hit his back rocking him forward in the harness. It pressed against him, tight bands crushing against his chest, digging into his skin. He tried to shake it off but the pain had used up his strength. As his body gave in to the pressures of the shift, his legs shook and his knees buckled but whatever had stuck to his back held him to the spot, his weight captured by the ropes. Just as he felt himself losing consciousness there was a rush of energy and with a blast of energy he was within the shift, racing forward with it. Light poured over his shoulder and time melted before his eyes, year after year piled on until the light showed a white concrete wall just a few metres in front of him.

The shift ground to a halt. After a moment the clasps on his chest released, and he hung in the harness his mass supported by the ropes dragging breath into his lungs through throat raw from screams he did not realise he had cried. The light was still, but it was moving. Circling to the left, dipping under the carabiners, moving past him. Fighting the harness for balance he found his feet, hands fumbling for purchase on the wall.

"Stop!" he tried to shout, but his ravaged voice came out as a croak.

"I've got this, spaceman." Donna's voice came back to him, kind, reassuring, teasing. "Honestly if you want a job doing properly you have to do it yourself round here."

"What?" he blinked away the dizziness and unclipped both carabiners with shaking hands. "You shouldn't be here."

"Your 'triangulation device' stopped working," she said, miming the inverted commas with her fingers. "Now stop complaining and help me. We've got about two minutes to cut these leads."

The Doctor spotted a huge plastic box bolted to the side of the tunnel with one thick lead heading in and another thick lead heading out. "Or we could just pull these two apart?"

With a hefty tug both cables separated, the exertion sending the Doctor back to his knees.

"Oh my god, we did it!" Donna exclaimed, wrapping her arms around the Doctor and hauling him back up, "We did it!"

"Not quite finished yet," he murmured, his head spinning. "Where's the TARDIS?"

"Outside somewhere," she said, then her smile dropped, "In 1901."

"And we're in 2008." The Doctor staggered backwards, gripping Donna's arm in one hand, the other flailing for the metal rods. "We've one shift left, there's enough residual energy to bump us back."

"What about the hub?" Donna asked, "They'll be stuck in 1901!"

"Doesn't matter," he clipped one carabiner in place with effort. "The hub has to vanish from 2008, that's a fixed point in history. As long as Darijus and Max stay inside we can rescue them, whatever time zone they are in."

Donna took the other hook from his shaking hands and secured it to the fixing point, tugging it for reassurance. "Great, another joy ride on a time wave. And I enjoyed the last one so much."

She wrapped her arms around him again, gripping his shirt in her fingers.

The shift was different this time, laboured with reduced power. Slowed, with its heart draining, it pulled them in. Donna felt the presence of the hub on the other side of the wall, it tugged at her, straining her grip on the Doctor. Looking up at him in panic she saw a kind of terror in his eyes and he looped his arms around her locking his fingers behind her back. She gripped him more tightly too, her face pressed against his chest she could feel the hammering of his hearts against her cheek, a strange hypnotic sensation that rang in her ears.

"Hold on!" he screamed, "Donna! Don't let go!"

Behind the concrete wall there was a terrible grinding of metal ripping across rock. It vibrated along the tunnel shaking loose bricks and rocks above them. They felt their chest being pulled apart, Donna's grip breaking and her weight pulling against the Doctor's linked fingers.

"No!" he cried out again, "Hold on, Donna. Please!"

Her grip broken Donna looped her arms under his armpits, but it wasn't enough. The pull of the wormhole broke his grip and Donna fell backwards, arms flailing. With one last lunge he reached for her, catching her hand as the metal rods that supported them snapped.


	11. Chapter 11

They came to rest in the dirt. A pile of arms and legs twisted together, the Doctor’s hand still locked around Donna’s. The impact had winded them both ,and it was the Doctor who moved first, lifting Donna’s face from his chest and sliding sideways and rolling to his knees with an audible groan. Donna’s head torch, still illuminated, had landed nearby, and the Doctor scooped it up, shining the light into his companion’s face making her blink and throw an arm over her eyes.

“Do you have to?” she asked, her voice rough from screaming. “That was bad enough without being blinded.”

“Sorry,” he turned the torch to the floor. “Are you all right?”

Donna noted that the Doctor’s voice was as raw as her own and with the light now pointing to the side she could see the ghost of some emotion in his face, one she could not name. Getting to her knees she met him, eye to eye, and smiled.

“Nothing a long soak in a hot bath won’t fix,” she said and pulled herself to her feet, offering her hand to him as he found his balance. “What about you, Doctor? Are you all right?”

He nodded and for the first time in days the accompanying smile reassured Donna that he was, for once, being honest.

“Come on,” he swung the light back down the tunnel. “Let’s see if we made it to 1901.”

“And if we haven’t?” she asked, afraid of the answer.

“Well,” he said, thinking. “If it’s later than 1901 the TARDIS will have found a nice safe place to wait and we’ll find her, with a bit of help from the sonic.”

“And if we’re too early?”

“Let’s worry about that if it happens,” the Doctor answered, and led on before Donna could ask more questions he could not answer.

 

Staggering over the bricks on the floor the Doctor led the way stopping far short of the place where they had entered and shining the light to the ceiling. Above them the entrance hatch showed no signs of welding. A metal ladder was bolted to the wall, and the Doctor began to climb, his progress slow as he made sure Donna was behind him. With every muscle aching it felt as though they were climbing from the centre of the earth, but it was not long before the Doctor reached the metal grating that had barred his entrance earlier.

With a blast of the sonic and several shoves more than the Doctor felt it should have taken, he pushed the lid clear allowing fresh air to pour into the chamber. Relief dizzied his senses and as he climbed up from the depths he drew a deep, chilled, breath. Exhausted, Donna’s feet failed to make landfall, and she toppled to her knees, gulping in oxygen. The Doctor wrapped a protective arm around her and held her steady as she pushed herself away from the access shoot. 

Distant lights pricked the blackness of night and a wisp of fog draped across the land, hovering a few centimetres from the dirt. There was a smell of coal fires in the air and in the distance church bells rang out on both sides of the river. 

“Did we make it?” Donna asked as her breathing returned to normal.

He nodded, his head dropping to his chest as a wave of exhaustion passed through him. “We made it. A few weeks after we arrived I think. But the TARDIS is where we left her,” he pointed to a small blue light in the darkness, “There she is, calling us home.”

“And is it over?” she whispered, using his arm as a lever to rise from the ground. 

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “Come on. Let’s get back to the TARDIS and find out.”

 

Cracking open the TARDIS door with trepidation the Doctor peeked inside, holding the door ajar just a fraction allowing him to see the central column and the console. Lights flashed on the panels, their brilliance returned to normal. In the centre the time rotor glowed bright blue. With a beaming smile he threw open the door and sauntered in, patting the nearest piece of coral with affection. Draping his dirty coat over the railing he turned to watch Donna cross the threshold, tiredness and relief mixing on her face making her eyes puffy and her skin drawn. 

“Everything is back to normal,” he told her with more cheer that was necessary. “No anomalies, nothing showing as being out of time. No dinosaurs, no skyscrapers, not German bombers. This is boring and normal 1901.” 

The monitor which had been consumed by the swirling wormhole was now blank. There were no mauve lights, no urgent beacons. The TARDIS was operating normally and was happy with the way of the world.

With a pretence of enthusiasm he set some dials and flicked switches, watching Donna as he did so. Her movements were stiff and pained, her face was grey with worry.

“Darijus and Max?” she asked, forcing herself to look at the Doctor.

“Let’s go and get them,” he replied. “I don’t want to take the TARDIS so it’s another hike back to the temple.”

“I don’t care,” she said, hope glimmered in her eyes. It brought her back to herself, and she straightened to her full height, pulling her shoulders back. 

 

It was Donna who led the pace back to the temple, not that she realised it. With a cross between a hobbled walk and a jog she hurried onwards and the Doctor mirrored her speed, half a step ahead. A hard lump had developed in his sternum, a block of fear he could not shift. There was nothing in the TARDIS’ readings that suggested anything had occurred at all, and that was perplexing. There should have been something, even the slightest sign of fluctuation in energy readings. It was as though the hub did not exist at all. 

The steps into the temple were frosted and Donna took them one at a time, her eagerness niggled by the Doctor’s uneasy silence. Donna, too, felt something was wrong, but she could not identify the cause. Passing through the assembly room they moved towards the rear door. The door was closed, Donna pulled on the handle, using her full body weight against the seal with no success. The Doctor frowned and put his efforts into opening the lock.

“It won’t budge,” he told her. “Deadlock sealed.” 

“How can that be?” Donna asked, “It wasn’t like this before.”

The sonic glowed brightly as the Doctor waved it around the edges of the door, first clockwise, then in long vertical passes. He shook his head, eyebrows knitted.

“This doesn’t make sense. It’s been deadlocked from the inside.”

The Doctor’s frown intensified as he dropped to the floor and scanned under the door making Donna move sideways.

“How could Darijus or Max deadlock seal it? Isn’t that a Martian thing?” Donna’s voice was rising in panic. “How could they do a Martian thing when they aren’t Martians?”

“It’s not… it’s not a Martian thing,” he replied, getting back to his feet slowly, “It’s a technological thing, and Torchwood have the ability. I think we might have Captain Jack to thank for that, damn him.”

“And there’s no way through it?” 

The Doctor shook his head, “Not with a sonic screwdriver there isn’t. We need the key which could be anything from a pin code to a genetic marker.”

“But they are stuck in there,” Donna cried, “How long for?”

“I don’t know,” his face was grim. “Donna, I’m sorry I don’t think I can get to them.”

“What about the TARDIS?” she demanded, “Can’t you just fly her in there?”

The look of fear on Donna’s face cut into the Doctor’s hearts. It was Pompei all over again and he could feel his face hardening as he cut off his own feelings. 

“I can’t,” he replied, his words short and painful.

“What do you mean, you can’t?” Donna’s voice raised a pitch.

“The hub didn’t even show up on the TARDIS sensors,” the Doctor admitted. “It’s as though it never existed at all.”

“But that’s impossible….”

“Not impossible but… very unlikely.” 

He stared at the door for a moment and then sighed, “We can’t do anything here. Let’s go back to the TARDIS.”

“And do what?” Donna demanded, “Leave them to it? Swan off and pretend it never happened?”

“No,” his word a promise. “I’m going to find them Donna, but I can’t do it from here. There is literally nothing to see.”

Donna’s panic eased as the Doctor took her hand and led her away, but the sickness in the pit of her stomach continued to churn. 

“What about the other tunnels?” Donna tried again, “We walked out through a tunnel before, can’t we walk in through it now?”

“Perhaps,” he agreed, “But I don’t think it will be that easy.”

“Can’t we try?”

He took a long breath, holding it for a moment then stopped and pointed to the edge of the river that was just visible through the trees. “If you want to walk out there, through the mud, over the marsh and hope they haven’t sealed themselves in, be my guest. I will try to fly the TARDIS in closer, maybe get us passed the physical barrier."

With a silent tear Donna realised the Doctor was quite right and as they walked, she was grateful for his arm that wrapped around her shoulders, providing more comfort than warmth. 

 

The phone inside the TARDIS was ringing when the Doctor opened the door and he looked at it in astonishment for a few seconds before darting across and lifting the receiver.

“Who is this?” he asked suspiciously. 

“Doctor!” an American twang filled his ear, “Long time no see!”

“Jack!” the Doctor breathed a sigh of relief, “Just the person I needed to see. Where are you? I’m coming for you.”

“Now there’s a promise,” Jack leered down the phone line, “Only I’m a bit tied up at the moment. Listen, I’ve had some strange readings and well, we’ve had a break in. Something dangerous has been stolen and I think it’s been used in error.”

“Time lock?” The Doctor asked, turning on the monitor and searching for the origin of the call. 

“Yeah,” Jack sighed, “You know all about it already I assume.”

“Know about it and fixed it,” he said. “At least for the most part. I’m missing two people and a place you know as Torchwood 4.”

There was silence on the end of the line and the Doctor checked the connection.

“Jack?” 

“Well that explains a few things,” Jack sounded displeased. “I can’t get to you. We’ve got problems with the rift and I’m needed here. What did you need from me?”

“There’s a deadlock seal in place. Do you have the key?”

“No,” the response was short. “They are limited issue to base users. Usually a swipe card and a retinal scan.”

“And Toshiko Sato?” the Doctor asked, “Can she help? It’s her software.”

“I think our times are out of sync, Doctor,” Jack’s voice was sad, “I don’t know when you are but it’s 2009 here. Tosh is dead. And she’s not the only one.”

The Doctor rubbed his tired eyes and glanced at Donna who sitting perfectly still on the jump seat, her face a mask. “Oh, Jack, I’m sorry….”

“And now you can’t cross the time streams to make this call earlier,” Jack’s tone was bitter. “Time travel, it’s such a messy business.”

“I need to get in there, Jack,” the Doctor insisted.

At the other end of the phone a female screamed and Jack lowered the phone to shout something to her. 

“Doc, I’ve gotta go. But there’s always a back door. No hub is built without one.”

“Okay, thanks. Oh and Jack when you get your vortex manipulator fixed leave me some clothes and a note in 1740.”

“Understood. Good luck.” Jack replied and cut off the phone.

 

Exhaustion rippled under the Doctor’s skin. Rolling his neck he broke the tension in his shoulders and looked once again at Donna, her face still set but silent tears dripping over her cheeks. Taking off his jacket he wrapped it around her, resting his hand on her shoulder and squeezing gently, bringing her out of her distant thoughts.

“Your phone never rings,” Donna said in a low voice. “Who was it? Wrong number?”

“No,” he said, taking a seat beside her and running a hand through his hair. “It was an old friend. He had noticed a change in the timelines, thought he should call.”

“Can he help? You know, if he’s a time traveller too.”

“Jack’s not really a time traveller as such,” the Doctor answered, “And he’s got his hands full. Apparently Cardiff is going to explode any minute.”

He sucked air through his teeth. “That would be a shame. I quite like Cardiff. Nice cafe. We went once, me and Rose and Mickey and Jack.”

Donna shook her head dismissing his random remembrances. “Did he say anything useful?”

“He mentioned a back door,” the Doctor pondered. “I wonder what that means.”

Turning out the side of his jacket the Doctor dug into the pocket and extracted one of the maps that Darijus had given him. It was dirty and the writing smudged, but it was serviceable.

“This is the main entrance,” the Doctor pointed to the temple and traced his finger back to the joining chamber and on to the lab. “And that’s where the computers are.”

The faintest possibility of hope stirred something in Donna and she leant forward placing her own finger on the scruffy paper. 

“That’s the morgue, generator room… and that’s the tunnel with the power connection.” 

The Doctor nodded, “So what’s that?”

There were two other tunnels, one they had been in when the roof collapsed and one other that seemed to go nowhere at all, just travelled a few hundred meters underground then stopped.

“I don’t know,” Donna squinted, “I thought the other tunnel was blocked off.”

“Unless it was a perception filter…” the Doctor pushed the paper into Donna’s hand and leapt up to the controls. In a moment there was a satellite image of the area on the screen and he narrowed the view until it was over a 2 mile square of the hub.

“Look,” he called to Donna, “Come and look at this.”

Stiffly Donna raised herself from the seat. 

“It’s a water tower.” Donna said, nonplussed. “We have them you know, to store drinking water.”

The Doctor pointed to the base of it. Four immense legs supported the concrete bowl at the top, but a fifth central stand was directly over the spot where the tunnel ended. He looked across at her with a renewed energy in his eyes.

“Back door?”

“Oh my god…” Donna’s arms wrapped around him and pulled him into a tight embrace, “I could kiss you, spaceman.”

He pulled a face and returned the hug with caution, “Donna, I want this to be the answer as much as you do but don’t let your hopes get too high. We still might not be able to get through.”

“But we’re going to try,” she said as she released him.

Flipping a few switches and releasing the handbrake the TARDIS shivered into life. With a gentle hum she moved with unusual grace, the time rotor pumping slowly as they re-materialised.

“I can’t get her into the tunnel,” the Doctor confessed, “There’s not enough space. But we are right under the water tower. Are you ready?”

Donna nodded, “Don’t suppose you have any lock cracking tools on board?”

“Not that will crack these locks,” he said, “But I’m counting on them not being able to get to this door to enforce it.”

 

A stiff wind blew in their faces as the TARDIS door swung open. It carried on it the smell of the distant sea, smog from the city and the smell of sour water from flooded stagnant ponds beside the Thames. Donna shivered and watched as the Doctor strode the ten steps between the TARDIS and the water tower’s central support. With a blast of the sonic screwdriver the padlock on the door bolt dropped to the floor and with both hands on the metal opener he heaved. Metal creaked and rusted hinges complained at the Doctor’s forceful entry but the door was wrenched open to expose a tight staircase heading both up and down.

Together they peered down the stairs which were narrow but illuminated when the Doctor reached inside and found a power switch to the right of the door. The stairwell was full of spiders webs and the white paint was flaking. No-one had used this entrance to the tower or the tunnel in a long time.

“Ladies first,” the Doctor said with a grin and Donna glowered at him. He knew very well she was not fond of spiders or their webs, being stuck in one with her cheating lying fiance hadn’t done much for her.

Nevertheless she stepped into the stairwell and began to descend, stepping slowly at first but with growing confidence and balance on the narrow stairs she was soon travelling at a reasonable pace, the Doctor following two steps behind. At the bottom they came to a small platformed area and a power box on the wall. There was no door. Donna felt her hopes sliding away again until the Doctor squeezed past her and waved the sonic up and down the power box.

“It’s not real,” the Doctor told her, “A perception filter with a low level lock. If I can just vibrate the particles in the illusion enough, it will all just…. Fade away.”

As he spoke the big black box and the wall behind it disappeared from view and a gun metal grey door was revealed. 

“Is it locked?” Donna asked.

“Yes,” was the short reply, “But not deadlocked. Give me a second and I’ll have it open.”

There was a click on the opposite site of the door and the handle released in the Doctor’s hand. With a shove he pushed his way in. The door opened to the style of tunnel they had associated with Torchwood Four, white painted brick dripping with water. Like the main entrance it was well maintained and strip lights in the centre of the arched ceiling made the path visible for several hundred meters.

Leading on the Doctor stepped into the tunnel and Donna pulled the door to behind them. 

“I don’t know about you,” Donna said softly, “But I’m tired of all this running up and down tunnels. Do you think next time we can do something different? You know, maybe run on a beach instead?”

A visible shudder crossed the Doctor’s shoulders, “Oh I don’t think a beach is a good idea. I’ve seen some terrible monsters come out of the sea and running on sand is really hard work.”

“Sea monsters?” she scoffed, “Are you pulling my leg again? Like the time you told me you’d been swimming with the Loch Ness Monster?”

“Nope, I’m serious,” he replied. “And who said I haven’t been swimming with Nessy?”

Donna laughed at him, “I just hope you weren’t skinny dipping.”

He stopped suddenly making Donna come up short and almost knock him over. The hairs on the back of his neck with standing up and Donna could see the tension in his shoulders as he raised a cautious hand to the air in front of him. 

“Time lock?” Donna asked.

He nodded and brushed his hand against the invisible wall. “A strong one. Far, far stronger than before.”

He turned around and looked at her with serious brown eyes, “Donna I don’t know that we’ll be able to get out of here if we walk back in.”

Donna swallowed hard. “If we don’t go in Darijus and Max, they’ll die, won’t they?”

A shadow passed over the Doctor’s face, “I don’t know, but yes, it’s likely.”

 

Donna stepped through the wall first feeling her skin pricked with thousands of sharp needles. The wall was thick and after three paces she could feel a sweat breaking out at the bottom of her spine. The needle jabs got harder and her eyes watered. Blinking away the pain she found herself examining her clothes expecting to see them shredded on her body. As she pushed through the far side of the wall she felt the air pop and the painful sensations stopped, leaving her gasping for breath in surprise. With a sickening feeling in her stomach she turned to see the Doctor fighting through, staggering as he breached the nearside wall.. 

“Wow,” he exclaimed with bravado, “That certainly smarts a bit.”

She looked at him with concern, the pain in his body clear as he tried to shake away the needling sensation from his arms. He was green around the gills and like his companion he gasped for pain free air. 

“You okay?” she asked.

He shrugged and gave her a warm, reassuring, smile. “Come on.”

 

At the far end of the tunnel they came to the junction room. A one way perception filter folded as they walked through and Donna was surprised to turn around and see she had just walked through a concrete wall. 

“That’s impressive,” she said, “I wish I’d had one of those when I was living at Mum’s. It might have kept her out of my room for a bit.”

“Not with your mother,” the Doctor joked, “She’d yell it into submission.”

“Oi, watch it,” Donna snapped. “Only I get to make jokes about my mother. You can pick on someone else.”

“Which way first?” he asked, gesturing to the tunnel leading to the office and Darijus’ lab on the left and then to the computer suite on the right.

“Left,” Donna said, “If all this worked they are probably in the office having a coffee. Max will be glad to get away from the computer.”

 

Donna set the pace, a fast walk along the tunnel until she came to the office door. Inside the light was on but no-one was present. The Doctor followed her in, his eyes searching the room as though he was not happy with what he found there. While he studied with more detail Donna ran on, first to the generator then on to the morgue. Within a minute she was back, her face red from exertion, concern creeping into her expression.

“Computer lab then,” the Doctor said, aware that the hard lump from his chest was growing. 

As they approached the lab Donna slowed in her pace, a deep uncertainty balling in her stomach. It reached up into her throat and gripped her vocal chords in a vice. She swallowed hard and found herself reaching for the Doctor’s hand as though she was a child approaching something terrifying. 

The lab door was open and Donna wavered as she crossed the threshold, her legs weak. The Doctor’s hand automatically tightened around hers as he took in the scene, fear swelling in his chest. 

Max sat at the computer, eyes fixed to the screen while Darijus stood to the side, a hand on Max’s shoulder and a rigid, grim smile on his face.

“Darijus?” Donna choked out. She moved closer and swallowed again, forcing vomit back into her stomach. “Max?”

The Doctor slipped his hand from hers and stepped forward again, his hands raised searching for the invisible wall he knew would be there. When his fingers met the barrier it sparked, and he stepped back in surprise, his expression dropping from half hope to deep sadness. He turned to Donna, and she read his face in an instant. Tears sprung into her eyes and she clamped a hand over her mouth to prevent a sob escaping. 

“I’m so sorry,” the Doctor whispered, his voice thick with emotion. 

“Can’t we get through?” the words pressed through her fingers, tears filling her red eyes and spilling over her cheeks. “Please? Isn’t there anything we can do?”

He turned to the wall again, his companion’s pain making him try one more time. With an exhale he pushed himself into the barrier feeling the sparks burn his skin. The pressure of the fixed time zone crushed chest until he couldn’t breath. 

She could not hear the Doctor cry out in pain but she could see him weakening and knew there was no hope. Running forward she swept in behind him forcing herself through the wall in his wake and with an arm around his chest pulled him backwards until they fell to the ground breathing heavily.

“I’m so… sorry… Donna,” the Time Lord gasped through his pain and reached for her, gathering her into a hug as she wrapped her arms around him. “The wall is too thick. It’s different this time.”

“How can it be?” she spoke into his shoulder, her whole body shuddering with the effort not to cry.

“I think…” he hesitated, “I think Max knew this could be unstable. I think they changed the settings to make sure the hub stayed in place, to prevent this happening again. To stop us from getting back in.”

“For how long?” Donna clutched desperately at straws, “Can we go forward in time and pick them up there? A hundred years, a thousand, a million?”

The Doctor drew a long, painful breath and stood placing both hands on the edge of the wall so that the spikes of energy bounced on his palms making him wince. He held the pose, breathing hard, his eyes closed until he staggered back and shook his head clear.

“Time isn’t moving inside there. It is motionless, completely still,” he told her, his voice soft and filled with terrible calm. “The wall is using all the energy, recycling it and keeping going in an endless loop.”

“What are you saying?” Donna’s mouth was dry. It hurt to breathe.

“They are stuck, in that second, until the end of the world.” The Doctor spoke so quietly that Donna strained to hear. “I am so sorry, Donna. I tried but I can’t… they won’t know anything about it. For them the end of the world is just a few seconds away. I can’t change it. They have become a fixed point in time and I… I can’t change it.”

She staggered to her feet and took his hand again. “It’s not your fault.”

“I should have guessed…” the darkness in his eyes consumed him.

Donna scrubbed the tears from her face and shook her head whispering, “No, I should have known... when Darijus gave me these.”

From her pocket she withdrew a series of envelopes and placed them on a desk with reverence. 

“I thought he was worrying about nothing,” Donna explained, “I thought that you could… that we could… save everyone.”

The Doctor sifted through the envelopes; letters to family. One each for those that had fallen before they had met them, Colonel Garde and Arjun. Another for Ellie’s mother, one for Max’s parents and one from Darijus with Donna’s name on it. This one he lifted from the desk and placed into Donna’s hand.

With shaking fingers she took the letter and pressed it to her chest, crumpling it in her palm as the Doctor wrapped his arms around her and held her tight. 

 

Epilogue

 

At the end of the universe Darijus Matas stood, his hand on Max Bryant’s shoulder. His breath was slow, feeling a change in the air. Max turned and looked up at him, a tear dripping down a dirty white cheek.

“Is it over?” Max whispered, staring at the orange glow behind the invisible wall. 

Darijus nodded, “After all this time, and no time at all.”

“It was worth it, though, wasn’t it?” Max asked softly. “We did save the world, in the end.”

“We saved the world,” Darijus replied, his voice thick and his words tender, “But really, I only wanted to save her.”

Outside the protective shell the orange had turned to white and a burst of heat pushed through, caressing their skins with a gentle breeze. It would be over soon. 

A wheezing roar made the walls of their cage shiver, cracks visible as the flames from a burning world pressed in on them. 

“I’m scared,” Max whispered.

“Everyone dies, Max,” Darijus’ voice was hushed, “But not everyone lives to see the end of the Earth.”

There was a rush of air as the barriers collapsed around them. Darijus pulled Max into a hug, burying his face in Max’s shoulder and Max choked back a cry at his chest. With a terrible wrenching the walls disintegrated and time realigned. The explosion outside their non-existent bubble blew them from their feet, across the floor, and through a blue wooden door.

“What the hell?” Max struggled against Darijus’ grip. 

The wheezing sound like a faulty respirator filled their ears, the blue door slammed shut, and they struggled to their feet. Darijus turned, grabbing a rail to steady himself as the rescue craft lurched to a breathless halt. 

On the opposite side of a circular control desk stood the familiar shape of the Doctor. Jacketless. Rain soaked. Face unreadable. Dead man standing. He threw a lever, and the door reopened, bright sunlight piercing the gloom. 

“Get out.” His words were lifeless.

Confused and terrified Max backed away, a hand on Darijus’ arm pulling him towards the exit.

“Where is Donna?” Darijus demanded, his heart paused in his chest. Afraid to beat.

“I said get out.” The Doctor marched forward, placing a hand on Darijus’ shoulder, pushing him through the doors roughly. 

Max blinked in the daylight, unaccustomed to the sun. “Where are we?”

Another man appeared, stepping out of thin air and catching Darijus and Max by the arm as they were shoved across the silver paving that rippled with reflected light. Both Darijus and Max new him at a glance.

“Cardiff,” Captain Jack replied. “What the hell are you doing here?”

The Doctor, his face expressionless, stood inside the door of his ship. “Torchwood 4’s finest, perfect for your new team, Captain.”

“I thought they were trapped?” Jack passed his newest staff members and approached the Doctor with apprehension. “Fifty years ago you told me Torchwood 4 was a fixed point. Unreachable. Going in there would break the laws of Time.”

Darijus and Max blanched. Fifty years ago?

“What year is this?” they said in unison.

“2073,” the Doctor replied, ignoring Jack’s statement. “You couldn’t return to your own time.”

“Why not?” Darijus demanded. “And where is Donna?”

The Doctor failed to avoid Captain Jack’s eye and was cornered by his friend’s stare.

“What did you do, Doctor?” Jack asked. “Why would you break your own damned laws?”

“When did lawbreaking become such a big deal to you, Jack?” The Doctor countered, tearing away from the Captain’s interrogation and forcing himself to meet Darijus’ eye. 

“Donna?” he spoke her name like a prayer.

“You were right,” the Doctor’s voice was thick and raw. “I am a dangerous man.”

Darijus looked the Time Lord up and down in a long, slow motion. He took in the shoes that seeped water and the rain flattened hair that drooped over his forehead almost covering the dark, dead eyes.

“No, Doctor, I was wrong.” Darijus voice was cold and bitter. He walked away, turning after a few steps to looked back at the Time Lord, tears and fury burning in his stare. “I thought you would always save her.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading. Merry Christmas everyone.


End file.
